In theory, physicists knew that antimatter should behave just like matter under gravity’s pull. But until now, no one had ever seen it happen
For the first time, scientists have observed antimatter particles falling under the effect of gravity—a phenomenon that was long theorized but never before seen.
Einstein’s general relativity breaks down at quantum scales, suggesting it is incomplete. Yet researchers remain flummoxed in their generations-spanning quest to forge a superior theory of quantum gravity. And antimatter lies at the heart of one of the biggest mysteries in existence. Antimatter’s volatility in the presence of matter poses a problem for studying it. The ALPHA collaboration scientists first make negatively charged antiprotons in an “antimatter factory,” a high-speed particle collider at CERN aptly called the Antiproton Decelerator. They then harvest positively charged positrons from a radioactive source, trapping these antimatter particles together in a vacuum to shield them from normal matter.
And it did. Within the experiment’s margin of error, the researchers could detect no gravitational differences between antihydrogen and hydrogen.
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