Gamma ray

Gamma radiation, also known as gamma rays or hyphenated as gamma-rays (especially in astronomy, by analogy with X-rays) and denoted as , is electromagnetic radiation of high frequency (very short wavelength). Gamma rays are usually naturally produced on Earth by decay of high energy states in atomic nuclei (gamma decay). Important natural sources are also high-energy sub-atomic particle interactions resulting from cosmic rays. Such high-energy reactions are also the common artificial source of gamma rays. Other man-made mechanisms include electron-positron annihilation, neutral pion decay, fusion, and induced fission. Some rare natural sources are lightning strike and terrestrial gamma-ray flashes, which produce high energy particles from natural high-energy voltages. Gamma rays are also produced by astronomical processes in which very high-energy electrons are produced. Such electrons produce secondary gamma rays by the mechanisms of bremsstrahlung, inverse Compton scattering and synchrotron radiation. Gamma rays are ionizing radiation and are thus biologically hazardous. A classical gamma ray source, and the first to be discovered historically, is a type of radioactive decay called gamma decay. In this type of decay, an excited nucleus emits a gamma ray almost immediately on formation, although isomeric transition can produce inhibited gamma decay with a measurable and much longer half-life. Paul Villard, a French chemist and physicist, discovered gamma radiation in 1900, while studying radiation emitted from radium.[1][2] Villard's radiation was named "gamma rays" by Ernest Rutherford in 1903.[3] Gamma rays typically have frequencies above 10 exahertz (or >1019 Hz), and therefore have energies above 100 keV and wavelength less than 10 picometers, less than the diameter of an atom. However, this is not a hard and fast definition but rather only a rule-of-thumb description for natural processes. Gamma rays from radioactive decay commonly have energies of a few hundred keV, and almost always less than 10 MeV. On the other side of the decay energy range, there is effectively no lower limit to gamma energy derived from radioactive decay. By contrast, energies from astronomical sources can be much higher, ranging over 10 TeV (this is far too large to result from radioactive decay). The distinction between X-rays and gamma rays has changed in recent decades. Originally, the electromagnetic radiation emitted by X-ray tubes almost invariably had a longer wavelength than the radiation emitted by radioactive nuclei (gamma rays).[5] Older literature distinguished between X- and gamma radiation on the basis of wavelength, with radiation shorter than some arbitrary wavelength, such as 1011 m, defined as gamma rays.[6] However, with artificial sources now able to duplicate any electromagnetic radiation that originates in the nucleus, as well as far higher energies, the wavelengths characteristic of radioactive gamma ray sources vs. other types, now completely overlaps. Thus, gamma rays are now usually distinguished by their origin: X-rays are emitted by definition by electrons outside the nucleus, while gamma rays are emitted by the nucleus.[5][7][8][9] Exceptions to this convention occur in astronomy, where high energy processes known to involve other than radioactive decay are still named as sources of gamma radiation. A notable example is extremely powerful bursts of high-energy radiation normally referred to as long duration gamma-ray bursts, which produce gamma rays by a mechanism not compatible with radioactive decay. These bursts of gamma rays,

thought to be due to collapse of stars called hypernovas, are the most powerful single events so far discovered in the cosmos. _____________________________________________________________________________________

Gamma-rays have the smallest wavelengths and the most energy of any other wave in the electromagnetic spectrum. These waves are generated by radioactive atoms and in nuclear explosions. Gamma-rays can kill living cells, a fact which medicine uses to its advantage, using gamma-rays to kill cancerous cells. Gamma-rays travel to us across vast distances of the universe, only to be absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere. Different wavelengths of light penetrate the Earth's atmosphere to different depths. Instruments aboard high-altitude balloons and satellites like the Compton Observatory provide our only view of the gamma-ray sky. Gamma-rays are the most energetic form of light and are produced by the hottest regions of the universe. They are also produced by such violent events as supernova explosions or the destruction of atoms, and by less dramatic events, such as the decay of radioactive material in space. Things like supernova explosions (the way massive stars die), neutron stars and pulsars, and black holes are all sources of celestial gamma-rays.

How do we "see" using gamma-ray light?

Gamma-ray astronomy did not develop until it was possible to get our detectors above all or most of the atmosphere, using balloons or spacecraft. The first gamma-ray telescope, carried into orbit on the Explorer XI satellite in 1961, picked up fewer than 100 cosmic gamma-ray photons! Unlike optical light and X-rays, gamma rays cannot be captured and reflected in mirrors. The high-energy photons would pass right through such a device. Gamma-ray telescopes use a process called Compton scattering, where a gamma-ray strikes an electron and loses energy, similar to a cue ball striking an eight ball.

The familiar sights of constantly shining stars and galaxies would be replaced by something ever-changing. Your gamma-ray vision would peer into the hearts of solar flares, supernovae, neutron stars, black holes, and active galaxies. Gamma-ray astronomy presents unique opportunities to explore these exotic objects. By exploring the universe at these high energies, scientists can search for new physics, testing theories and performing experiments which are not possible in earth-bound laboratories. The Crab nebula, shown also in the visible light image, was created by a supernova that brightened the night sky in 1054 A.D. In 1967, astronomers detected the remnant core of that star; a rapidly rotating, magnetic pulsar flashing every 0.33 second in radio waves. Perhaps the most spectacular discovery in gamma-ray astronomy came in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Detectors on board the Vela satellite series, originally military satellites, began to record bursts of gamma-rays -- not from Earth, but from deep space!

Gamma-ray bursts can release more energy in 10 seconds than the Sun will emit in its entire 10 billionyear lifetime! So far, it appears that all of the bursts we have observed have come from outside the Milky Way Galaxy. Scientists believe that a gamma-ray burst will occur once every few million years here in the Milky Way, and in fact may occur once every several hundred million years within a few thousand light-years of Earth.

Studied for over 25 years now with instruments on board a variety of satellites and space probes, including Soviet Venera spacecraft and the Pioneer Venus Orbiter, the sources of these enigmatic highenergy flashes remain a mystery. By solving the mystery of gamma-ray bursts, scientists hope to gain further knowledge of the origins of the Universe, the rate at which the Universe is expanding, and the size of the Universe.

Magnetic trap (atoms)

A magnetic trap uses a magnetic gradient to trap neutral particles with a magnetic moment. Although such traps have been employed for many purposes in physics research, they are best known as the last stage in cooling atoms to achieve Bose-Einstein condensation. The magnetic trap (as a way of trapping very cold atoms) was first proposed by David Pritchard. Operating principle Many atoms have a magnetic moment; their energy shifts in a magnetic field according to the formula . According to the principles of quantum mechanics the magnetic moment of an atom will be quantizized; that is, it will take on one of certain discrete values. If the atom is placed in a strong magnetic field, its magnetic moment will be aligned with the field. If a number of atoms are placed in the same field, they will be distributed over the various allowed values of magnetic quantum number for that atom. If a magnetic field gradient is superimposed on the uniform field, those atoms whose magnetic moments are aligned with the field will have lower energies in a higher field. Like a ball rolling down a hill, these atoms will tend to occupy locations with higher fields and are known as "high-field-seeking" atoms. Conversely, those atoms with magnetic moments aligned opposite the field will have higher energies in a higher field, tend to occupy locations with lower fields, and are called "low-field-seeking" atoms. It is impossible to produce a local maximum of the magnetic-field magnitude in free space; however, a local minimum may be produced. This minimum can trap atoms which are low-field-seeking if they do not have enough kinetic energy to escape the minimum. Typically, magnetic traps have relatively shallow field minima and are only able to trap atoms whose kinetic energies correspond to temperatures of a fraction of a kelvin. The field minima required for magnetic trapping can be produced in a variety of ways. These include permanent magnet traps, Ioffe configuration traps, QUIC traps and others. Microchip atom trap

Microchip atomic trap developed in ILS in 2005

The minimum magnitude of the magnetic field can be realized with the "atom microchip".[1] One of the first microchip atomic traps is shown on the right. The Z-shaped conductor (actually the golden Z-shaped strip painted on the Si surface) is placed into the uniform magnetic field (the field's source is not shown in the figure). Only atoms with positive spin-field energy were trapped. To prevent the mixing of spin states, the external magnetic field was inclined in the plane of the chip, providing the adiabatic rotation of the spin at the movement of the atom. In the first approximation, magnitude (but not orientation) of the magnetic field is responsible for effective energy of the trapped atom. The chip shown is 2 cm x 2 cm; this size was chosen for ease in manufacture. In principle, the size of such microchip traps can be drastically reduced. An array of such traps can be manufactured with conventional lithographic methods; such an array is considered a prototype of a q-bit memory cell for the quantum computer. Ways of transferring atoms and/or q-bits between traps are under development; the adiabatic optical (with offresonant frequencies) and/or the electrical control (with additional electrodes) is assumed.

Uses of Antimatter
Antimatter could possibly be the fuel that powers spaceships to the planets and perhaps the stars. "Mars in 6 weeks? And back in a total of four months That's the prediction of a design team working on antimatter rocket concepts at Pennsylvania State University. But first, you have to get the stuff - and store it. (PSU)" -Space craft would achieve much greater speeds and be able to stay in space for longer periods of time.

-Antimatter has tremendous energy -Matter-antimatter annihilation - the complete conversion of matter into energy - releases the most energy per unit mass of any known reaction in physics. -The popular belief is that an antimatter particle coming in contact with its matter counterpart yields energy, gamma rays up to 511,000 electron volts. -This could be used as an auxiliary energy source for the space program, saving millions in fossil fuels, but losing billions in dollars. -In fact, it would cost one-hundred billion dollars to create one milligram of antimatter.

What about using antimatter for power generation? -It costs far more energy to create antimatter than the energy one could get back from an antimatter reaction. Right now standard nuclear reactors, which take advantage of the decay of radioactive substances, are far more promising as power generating technology than antimatter. Something to keep

in mind, too, is that antimatter reactions - where antimatter and normal matter collide and release energy, require the same safety precautions as needed with nuclear reactions.

Antimatter for Medical Purposes -Antimatter isn't restricted to space; applications for medicinal purposes include a radioisotope generator for Positron Emission Tommography, and radiography for detection and possible treatment of tumors. -This is done by injecting isotopes into the brain, usually of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and flourine. -These isotopes are most often used, due to their rate of decay, usually a few minutes to a few hours. -As the radioisotopes migrate from the decay site, each becomes two photon. -The image then received is that of several thousand photons around a decay site; unlike x-rays, which can only show density, PET scans provide information such as chemical uptake. -Like all uses of antimatter, this procedure is costly, up to several million dollars.

Antimatter for Testing Theories of the Universe -Scientists have devised a method of testing antimatter, coming down to the simples element, Hydrogen. -Hydrogen was the most logical choice as it has been tested and contains one proton, neutron, and electron. -For the antihydrogen, there shoyuld be one antiproton, an antineutron, and a positron. -In theory, the electron should be attracted to the proton with the exact same force that the positron would be attracted to the antiproton. -If any of this should not happen, physicists will have to re-examine some of our most basic theories about the universe.

Antimatter weapon
An antimatter weapon is a hypothetical device using antimatter as a power source, a propellant, or an explosive for a weapon. Antimatter weapons do not currently exist due to the cost of production and the limited technology available to produce and contain antimatter in sufficient quantities for it to be a useful weapon. The United States Air Force, however, has been interested in military uses including destructive applications of antimatter since the Cold War, when it began funding antimatter-related

physics research. The primary theoretical advantage of such a weapon is that antimatter and matter collisions, though significantly limited by neutrino losses, still convert a larger fraction of the weapon's mass into explosive energy than a fusion reaction in a hydrogen bomb, which is on the order of only 0.7%.[citation needed] On March 24, 2004, Eglin Air Force Base Munitions Directorate official Kenneth Edwards spoke at the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts[1]. During the speech, Edwards ostensibly emphasized a potential property of positron weaponry, a type of antimatter weaponry: Unlike thermonuclear weaponry, positron weaponry would leave behind "no nuclear residue", such as the nuclear fallout generated by the nuclear fission reactions which power nuclear weapons. According to an article in San Francisco Chronicle, Edwards has granted funding specifically for positron weapons technology development, focusing research on ways to store positrons for long periods of time, a significant technical and scientific difficulty. There is considerable skepticism within the physics community about the viability of antimatter weapons. According to an article on the website of the CERN laboratories, which regularly produces antimatter, "There is no possibility to make antimatter bombs for the same reason you cannot use it to store energy: we can't accumulate enough of it at high enough density. (...) If we could assemble all the antimatter we've ever made at CERN and annihilate it with matter, we would have enough energy to light a single electric light bulb for a few minutes." Acquiring and storing antimatter Antimatter production and containment are major obstacles to the creation of antimatter weapons. Quantities measured in grams will be required to achieve destructive effect comparable with conventional nuclear weapons; one gram of antimatter annihilating with one gram of matter produces 180 terajoules, the equivalent of 42.96 kilotons of TNT (approximately 3 times the bomb dropped on Hiroshima - and as such enough to power an average city for an extensive amount of time). In reality, however, all known technologies for producing antimatter involve particle accelerators, and they are currently still highly inefficient and expensive. The production rate per year is only 1 to 10 nanograms.[1] In 2008, the annual production of antiprotons at the Antiproton Decelerator facility of CERN was several picograms at a cost of $20 million. Thus, at the current level of production, an equivalent of a 10MT hydrogen bomb, about 250 grams of antimatter will take 2.5 million years of the energy production of the entire Earth to produce. A milligram of antimatter will take 100000 times the annual production rate to produce.(or 100000 years)[2] It will take billions of years for the current production rate to make an equivalent of current typical hydrogen bombs.[3] For example, an equivalent of the Hiroshima atomic bomb will take half a gram of antimatter, but will take CERN 2 billion years to produce at the current production rate.[3] Since the first creation of artificial antiprotons in 1955, production rates increased nearly geometrically until the mid-1980s; A significant advancement was made recently as a single anti-hydrogen atom was produced suspended in a magnetic field. Physical laws such as the small cross-section of antiproton production in high-energy nuclear collisions make it difficult and perhaps impossible to drastically improve the production efficiency of antimatter. Even if it were possible to convert energy directly into particle/antiparticle pairs without any loss, a largescale power plant generating 2000 MWe would take 25 hours to produce just one gram of antimatter. Given the average price of electric power around $50 per megawatt hour, this puts a lower limit on the cost of antimatter at $2.5 million per gram.[citation needed] They suggest that this would make antimatter very

cost-effective as a rocket fuel, as just one milligram would be enough to send a probe to Pluto and back in a year, a mission that would be completely unaffordable with conventional fuels. Incidentally the cost of the Manhattan Project (to produce the first atomic bomb) is estimated at $20 billion in 1996 prices [4] Most scientists however would doubt whether such efficiencies could ever be achieved. The second problem is the containment of antimatter. Antimatter annihilates with regular matter on contact, so it would be necessary to prevent contact, for example by producing antimatter in the form of solid charged or magnetized particles, and suspending them using electromagnetic fields in near-perfect vacuum. Another, more hypothetical method is the storage of antiprotons inside fullerenes.[5] The negatively charged antiprotons would repel the electron cloud around the sphere of carbon, so they could not get near enough to the normal protons to annihilate with them. In order to achieve compactness given macroscopic weight, the overall electric charge of the antimatter weapon core would have to be very small compared to the number of particles. For example, it is not feasible to construct a weapon using positrons alone, due to their mutual repulsion. The antimatter weapon core would have to consist primarily of neutral antiparticles. Extremely small amounts of antihydrogen have been produced in laboratories, but containing them (by cooling them to temperatures of several millikelvins and trapping them in a Penning trap) is extremely difficult. And even if these proposed experiments were successful, they would only trap several antihydrogen atoms for research purposes, far too few for weapons or spacecraft propulsion. Heavier antimatter atoms have yet to be produced. The difficulty of preventing accidental detonation of an antimatter weapon may be contrasted with that of a nuclear weapon. In an antimatter weapon, any failure of containment would immediately result in energy release, which would probably further damage the containment system and lead to the release of all of the antimatter material, causing the weapon to explode at some very substantial fraction of its full yield. By contrast, a modern nuclear weapon will explode with a significant yield if and only if the chemical explosive triggers are fired at precisely the right sequence at the right time, and a neutron source is triggered at exactly the right time. In short, an antimatter weapon would have to be actively kept from exploding; a nuclear weapon will not explode unless active measures are taken to make it do so. Antimatter catalyzed weapons Antimatter catalyzed nuclear pulse propulsion proposes the use of antimatter as a "trigger" to initiate small nuclear explosions; the explosions provide thrust to a spacecraft. The same technology could theoretically be used to make very small and possibly "fission-free" (very low nuclear fallout) weapons (see Pure fusion weapon). Antimatter catalysed weapons could be more discriminate and result in less long-term contamination than conventional nuclear weapons, and their use might therefore be more politically acceptable. Igniting fusion fuel requires at least a few kilojoules of energy (for laser induced fast ignition of fuel precompressed by a z-pinch), which corresponds to around 1013 gram of antimatter, or 1011 anti-hydrogen atoms. Fuel compressed by high explosives could be ignited using around 1018 protons to produce a weapon with a one kiloton yield. These quantities are clearly more feasible than those required for "pure" antimatter weapons, but the technical barriers to producing and storing even small amounts of antimatter remain formidable.

Antimatter rocket
An antimatter rocket is a proposed class of rockets that use antimatter as their power source. There are several designs that attempt to accomplish this goal. The advantage to this class of rocket is that a large fraction of the rest mass of a matter/antimatter mixture may be converted to energy, allowing antimatter rockets to have a far higher energy density and specific impulse than any other proposed class of rocket. Antimatter rockets can be divided into three types: those that directly use the products of antimatter annihilation for propulsion, those that heat a working fluid which is then used for propulsion, and those that heat a working fluid to generate electricity for some form of electric spacecraft propulsion system. Direct use of reaction products Antiproton annihilation reactions produce charged and uncharged mesons, in addition to gamma rays. The charged mesons can be channelled by a magnetic nozzle, producing thrust. This type of antimatter rocket is a beamed core configuration. It is not perfectly efficient; energy is lost as the rest mass of the charged and uncharged mesons, lost as the kinetic energy of the uncharged mesons (which can't be deflected for thrust), and lost as gamma rays. Positron annihilation has also been proposed for rocketry. Annihilation of positrons produces only gamma rays. Early proposals for this type of rocket, such as those developed by Eugen Snger, assumed the use of some material that could reflect gamma rays, used as a light sail to derive thrust from the annihilation reaction. No viable means of specularly reflecting gamma rays has been proposed (no solid material has this property, and plasma is not sufficiently reflective to gamma rays under practically attainable conditions). However, the momentum of gamma rays can indeed be partially transferred to matter by Compton scattering. [edit] Antimatter heating of an exhaust fluid Several methods for heating an exhaust fluid using the gamma rays produced by positron annihilation have been proposed.[1] These methods resemble those proposed for nuclear thermal rockets. One proposed method is to use positron annihilation gamma rays to heat a solid engine core. Hydrogen gas is ducted through this core, heated, and expelled from a rocket nozzle. A second proposed engine type uses positron annihilation within a solid lead pellet or within compressed xenon gas to produce a cloud of hot gas, which heats a surrounding layer of gaseous hydrogen. Direct heating of the hydrogen by gamma rays was considered impractical, due to the difficulty of compressing enough of it within an engine of reasonable size to absorb the gamma rays. A third proposed engine type uses annihilation gamma rays to heat an ablative sail, with the ablated material providing thrust. As with nuclear thermal rockets, the specific impulse achievable by these methods is limited by materials considerations, typically being in the range of 10002000 seconds.[citation needed] [edit] Antimatter power generation The idea of using antimatter to power an electric space drive has also been proposed. These proposed designs are typically similar to those suggested for nuclear electric rockets. Antimatter annihilations are used to directly or indirectly heat a working fluid, as in a nuclear thermal rocket, but the fluid is used to generate electricity, which is then used to power some form of electric space propulsion system. The

resulting system shares many of the characteristics of other electric propulsion proposals (typically high specific impulse and low thrust).[citation needed] [edit] Difficulties with antimatter rockets The chief practical difficulties with antimatter rockets are the problems of creating antimatter and storing it. Creating antimatter requires input of vast amounts of energy, at least equivalent to the rest energy of the created particle/antiparticle pairs, and typically (for antiproton production) tens of thousands to millions of times more.[citation needed] Most proposed antimatter rocket designs require a large amount of antimatter (around 10 grams to reach Mars in one month).[2] Most storage schemes proposed for interstellar craft require the production of frozen pellets of antihydrogen. This requires cooling of antiprotons, binding to positrons, and capture of the resulting antihydrogen atoms - tasks which have, as of 2010, been performed only for small numbers of individual atoms. Storage of antimatter is typically done by trapping electrically charged frozen antihydrogen pellets in Penning or Paul traps. While there is no theoretical barrier to these tasks being performed on the scale required to fuel an antimatter rocket, they are expected to be extremely (and perhaps prohibitively) expensive.[citation needed] A secondary problem is the extraction of useful energy or momentum from the products of antimatter annihilation, which are primarily in the form of extremely energetic ionizing radiation. The antimatter mechanisms proposed to date have for the most part provided plausible mechanisms for harnessing energy from these annihilation products.