antimatter Archives - News@91��ɫ

Does an antimatter apple fall up or down? Scientists solve longstanding mystery

sandramc — Wed, 27 Sep 2023 15:27:20 +0000

91��ɫ is part of an international collaboration that has resolved the enigma of whether antimatter follows the rules of gravity

TORONTO, Sept. 27, 2023 – As Isaac Newton observed, an apple falls from the tree and hits the ground. But what would an antimatter apple do? That was the question an international collaboration with 91��ɫ Professor Emeritus Scott Menary set out to answer.

Ultimately, the team is testing Albert Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, one of the twin pillars of 20th century physics alongside quantum mechanics. The idea was to see if General Relativity also held true for antimatter or, in this specific case, antihydrogen.

What they found is yes, antihydrogen, like hydrogen, falls down, not up.

91��ɫ Professor Emeritus Scott Menary holding an apple under an apple tree. Credit: 91��ɫ

“The result is a technical tour de force given the difficulty of measuring the effect of gravity – a force much weaker than most people realize – on just a small collection of antihydrogen atoms,” says 91��ɫ Professor Emeritus Scott Menary of the Faculty of Science. “If Newton had observed an anti-apple instead of an apple, he would have seen nothing unusual, as it turns out, an anti-apple would also fall down.”

The antimatter gravity measurement was carried out by the Antihydrogen Laser Physics Apparatus (ALPHA) collaboration using the new ALPHA-g apparatus, now in operation at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. Menary was co-project manager of construction for ALPHA-g’s radial Time Projection Chamber (rTPC), which he also helped design. The rTPC was one of two new detectors used in the experiment to observe where the antihydrogen annihilated with matter in the apparatus.

The experiment works by first creating a sample of antihydrogen atoms and trapping (holding) them in an extraordinarily cold magnetic bottle. ALPHA-g physicists then released the antihydrogen by varying magnetic fields so as to witness and measure its gravitational behaviour. It was the first direct freefall measurement of the force of gravity on antimatter.

But Menary points out that they aren’t finished. “We are upgrading our apparatus, including using laser cooling, to improve the precision of our measurement.”

The rTPC on the bench at CERN before being installed in ALPHA-g. Credit: CERN

ALPHA has previously carried out precise tests of the charge and colour of antihydrogen, which to-date constitutes the sternest test of the symmetries of the quantum mechanical description of nature. These results combined with the new measurement on the effect of gravity on antimatter relate to one of the central questions of modern physics – what happened to all of the antimatter created in the Big Bang?

“Right now, we don’t have an explanation about where all the antimatter in the universe is. To find a solution for this conundrum, what we do is test the element of physics of antimatter to see if we can find an inconsistency. In this case, we tested to see if the gravitational characteristics of antihydrogen mirror those of hydrogen, which is significant because it’s never been done before,” says physics Professor Robert Thompson, associate vice-president (research) at the University of Calgary and principal investigator of the ALPHA-g Canada Foundation for Innovation Project.

Applied physicist Pierre Grandemange coordinates the construction of the ALPHA-g apparatus at CERN in Switzerland. Credit: CERN

ALPHA-g is an international partnership of research institutions including, on the Canadian side, 91��ɫ, the University of Calgary, Simon Fraser University, TRIUMF, the University of British Columbia, and the British Columbia Institute of Technology as well as post-secondary institutions and research institutes in Europe, the United Kingdom, the United States, Israel and Brazil.

"This milestone is a culmination of nearly 20 years of dedication and teamwork. The contributions of the members of ALPHA-Canada were critical to our success,” said Dr. Makoto C. Fujiwara, senior scientist, TRIUMF, and ALPHA-Canada spokesperson. "ALPHA-Canada is a pan-Canadian collaboration made up of a diverse group of students, postdoctoral scholars, academics and staff members, each who played a vital role in this project."

The paper, , is published today in the journal Nature.

This is the first major result from the ALPHA-g apparatus, which was funded through the Canada Foundation for Innovation. Major contributing partners include the Government of Alberta, the British Columbia Knowledge Development Fund, the Ontario Research Fund, Carlsberg Foundation (Denmark), and UK Government funding through the University of Manchester and Swansea University.

About 91��ɫ

91��ɫ is a modern, multi-campus, urban university located in Toronto, Ontario. Backed by a diverse group of students, faculty, staff, alumni and partners, we bring a uniquely global perspective to help solve societal challenges, drive positive change, and prepare our students for success. 91��ɫ's fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education. 91��ɫ’s campuses in Costa Rica and India offer students exceptional transnational learning opportunities and innovative programs. Together, we can make things right for our communities, our planet, and our future.

Media Contact: Sandra McLean, 91��ɫ Media Relations, 416-272-6317, sandramc@yorku.ca

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91��ɫ and T2K experiment researchers closer to solving antimatter puzzle

roshanp — Wed, 15 Apr 2020 15:29:44 +0000

TORONTO, Wednesday, April 15, 2020 – Why is there an abundance of matter compared to antimatter in the Universe? This question has stymied physicists for years, but researchers at 91��ɫ, along with other Canadian institutions as part of the international Tokai-to-Kamioka (T2K) Collaboration, have found neutrinos may hold the answer.

The international is aimed at unraveling this matter-antimatter conundrum by studying neutrinos, subatomic particles produced in huge numbers immediately after the Big Bang. They come in three types – electron, muon, and tau neutrinos – and are created in stars, inside the earth, the atmosphere and at accelerators, such as J-PARC in Japan, where the T2K experiment is conducted.

To tackle this puzzle, the T2K team, including 91��ɫ Faculty of Science physics Professor , the project leader for the optical transition radiation (OTR) detector for the experiment, was looking for behavioural differences of neutrinos (matter) and antineutrinos (antimatter) as they change states during flight into electron neutrinos and electron antineutrinos, respectively.

If matter and antimatter exhibit the same behaviour, charge-parity symmetry implies that the laws of physics are the same for matter and antimatter. But this doesn’t appear to always hold true. For example, there is way more matter than antimatter in the Universe. To account for the observed level of asymmetry, researchers believe there must have been a violation of charge-parity symmetry in the early Universe initiated by neutrinos.

T2K team found the strongest indication yet of this violation in charge-parity symmetry between neutrinos and antineutrinos, but more work is needed to definitively prove it.

The results, published in the journal today, are a major step forward in the study of what caused the original difference between matter and antimatter.

"Neutrino transformations are a beautiful way to study the matter-antimatter asymmetry in the Universe," says Bhadra, who is also a TRIUMF affiliate scientist. "What can be more exciting than studying a particle that may hold the clue to our very existence?"

The T2K experiment used a beam consisting primarily of muon neutrinos or muon antineutrinos created using the proton beam from the in Tokai, Japan. A small fraction of the neutrinos (or antineutrinos) are detected 295 km away at the Super-Kamiokande water Cerenkov detector in Kamioka, Japan. Previously, T2K studied how the original neutrinos (antineutrinos) transition or oscillate into electron neutrinos (antineutrinos) as they traverse the distance from Tokai to Kamioka (hence the name T2K) in a process called “neutrino oscillations.” This was the subject of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2015.

The T2K collaboration consists of close to 500 scientists from 12 countries, including Canada. The Canadian effort provided some of the most challenging and critical detectors of the project – the time projection chamber, the fine-grained calorimeter and an OTR detector – and contributed to the success of T2K through key leadership roles.

“Canadian scientists look forward to building on the success of the T2K experiment to realize even more precise measurements of neutrino oscillations through upgrades of the experimental apparatus,” said TRIUMF Professor Mark Hartz, the corresponding author on the paper, former research associate at 91��ɫ, and leader of the Canadian-led Intermediate Water Cerenkov Detector project.

Bhadra says, “91��ɫ will continue to be involved in neutrino physics with more sensitive neutrino experiments being built in the future that will surely provide an answer to the question: what happened to the antimatter?”

Photo of Professor Sampa Bhadra:

Photo of Cover of Nature:

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91��ɫ champions new ways of thinking that drive teaching and research excellence. Our students receive the education they need to create big ideas that make an impact on the world. Meaningful and sometimes unexpected careers result from cross-disciplinary programming, innovative course design and diverse experiential learning opportunities. 91��ɫ students and graduates push limits, achieve goals and find solutions to the world’s most pressing social challenges, empowered by a strong community that opens minds. 91��ɫ U is an internationally recognized research university – our 11 faculties and 25 research centres have partnerships with 200+ leading universities worldwide. Located in Toronto, 91��ɫ is the third largest university in Canada, with a strong community of 53,000 students, 7,000 faculty and administrative staff, and more than 300,000 alumni. 91��ɫ U's fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education.

Media Contact:

Sandra McLean, 91��ɫ Media Relations, 416-272-6317, sandramc@yorku.ca

Find out more about how 91��ɫ is creating positive change in the COVID-19 pandemic .

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Scientists shine light on whereabouts of antimatter

roshanp — Mon, 19 Dec 2016 17:45:47 +0000

TORONTO, December 19, 2016 – An international collaboration, including 91��ɫ, has successfully shone a laser on antimatter atoms to come up with the first successful spectroscopic measurement.

The Big Bang theory requires equal amounts of matter and antimatter to have been created at the beginning of time, but there is little antimatter in the universe now. What happened to all the antimatter is a question scientists from the ALPHA Collaboration, including the ALPHA-Canada group, have spent years trying to find clues to answer. The spectroscopic measurement brings that search one step closer and is considered a major breakthrough.

“What we were trying to do is compare antihydrogen to hydrogen to see if they have the exact same characteristics. Something happened to all the antimatter so that points to there being some slight difference between a matter particle and its antimatter twin,” said 91��ɫ physics of the ALPHA-Canada group.

https://youtu.be/iWzyss8ih7w

The scientists created and trapped antihydrogen atoms in a cryogenically cooled and vacuum-tight cylindrical chamber using a system of magnetic fields. Learning to produce and trap antihydrogen was a huge feat that took six years to do as matter and antimatter annihilate upon contact. Once they were able to trap the antihydrogen atoms, it took another six years to learn how to shine laser light on them at various frequencies to see what would happen.

Antihydrogen atoms absorb light only at specific frequencies. Precisely measuring the distribution of those absorbed frequencies (spectroscopy), paints a unique fingerprint of the atom. The researchers found that at a specific frequency the antimatter atoms behaved the same as hydrogen atoms meaning they both absorbed light at the same frequency.

“Laser measurement on antimatter atoms has been a dream in the field for decades,” said Makoto Fujiwara, TRIUMF research scientist and spokesperson for the ALPHA-Canada group. “We are thrilled and relieved that we finally achieved what we set out to do when we started up in 2004, not least because ALPHA stands for Antihydrogen Laser Physics Apparatus.”

A central challenge was getting the laser system to work in a system cooled to just above absolute zero. The cooling cryostat was designed and built at TRIUMF and the University of Calgary, and its design allowed the collaboration the opportunity to try various techniques that ultimately led to the system’s success.

The next experiment in the quest will involve dropping antihydrogen to see if it reacts the same as hydrogen in the gravitational field of the earth.

is known for championing new ways of thinking that drive teaching and research excellence. Our students receive the education they need to create big ideas that make an impact on the world. Meaningful and sometimes unexpected careers result from cross-discipline programming, innovative course design and diverse experiential learning opportunities. 91��ɫ students and graduates push limits, achieve goals and find solutions to the world’s most pressing social challenges, empowered by a strong community that opens minds. 91��ɫ U is an internationally recognized research university – our 11 faculties and 26 research centres have partnerships with 200+ leading universities worldwide. Located in Toronto, 91��ɫ is the third largest university in Canada, with a strong community of 53,000 students, 7,000 faculty and administrative staff, and more than 295,000 alumni. 91��ɫ U's fully bilingual Glendon campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education.

TRIUMF is Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics and accelerator-based science. We are an international centre for discovery and innovation, advancing fundamental, applied, and interdisciplinary research for science, medicine, and business. Owned and operated by a university consortium, TRIUMF trains and inspires future leaders in science and technology. Our laboratory is a hub for inquiry and ingenuity, a Canadian centre of excellence deeply integrated into the global scientific community. TRIUMF’s multidisciplinary team of over 500 staff and trainees collaborates with Canadian and international users who visit the laboratory to leverage our world-class facilities. Together, we drive compelling research and develop ideas and innovations that benefit humanity. See http://www.triumf.ca. Connect on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram: TRIUMFLab

ALPHA is an international collaboration of 15 institutions from Canada, Brazil, Denmark, Israel, Japan, Sweden, UK, and the USA. The ALPHA-Canada authors (22 of the 54 total) are: TRIUMF - Andrea Capra, Robert Collister, Joseph McKenna, Mario Michan*, David Gill, Makoto Fujiwara, Leonid Kurchaninov, Konstantin Olchanski, Art Olin, Simone Straka*; UBC - Nathan Evetts, Andrea Gutierrez*, Walter Hardy, Takamasa Momose ; SFU - Justine Munich, Michael Hayden; University of Calgary - Andrew Evans, Tim Friesen*, Chukman So, Robert Thompson; 91��ɫ - Melissa Mathers, Scott Menary, James Thompson. (*students/postdoc who moved on). See http://alpha.web.cern.ch/alpha

Media Contact:
Sandra McLean, 91��ɫ Media Relations, 416-736-2100 ext. 22097, sandramc@yorku.ca

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Neutral result charges up antimatter research

roshanp — Wed, 20 Jan 2016 18:22:15 +0000

TORONTO, January 20, 2016 – Scientists of the international ALPHA Collaboration have once again pushed the boundaries of antimatter research with their latest breakthrough studying the properties of antihydrogen. Published today in the prestigious journal , the collaboration’s result improved the measurement of the charge of antihydrogen, essentially zero, by a factor of 20. Their work is the latest contribution in the quest to chase down the answer to the basic antimatter question, “If matter and antimatter were created in equal amounts during the Big Bang, where did all the antimatter go?”

A view from the Experimental Zone floor of the ALPHA-2 Cryostat and external solenoid assembly, with control and data acquisition electronics located on the overhead platform above the cryostat. Photo by Robert Thompson, ALPHA-2 member, University of Calgary

“That means the electrical charge of antihydrogen – the antimatter analogue of hydrogen – can be ruled out as the answer to the antimatter question,” says 91��ɫ Professor , an ALPHA member. “The point of the experiment was to search for a clue as to how or where our predictions of nature are wrong,” continues Menary. “Something is missing in our understanding otherwise the matter and antimatter at the Big Bang would have annihilated each other and there would be no universe today. The interactions of matter and antimatter must somehow be different.”

Physics dictates that for every particle of matter there is an oppositely charged antiparticle with an equal mass. An antihydrogen atom should have the exact same charge as hydrogen (zero). That’s because the antiproton and antielectron (positron), which make up antihydrogen, should have the exact opposite charge of the proton and electron that make up hydrogen.

Dr. Andrea Capra, a former PhD student of Menary’s (now at TRIUMF) who played a major role in the analysis behind this result, says, “We take the charge of matter and antimatter for granted, however, you cannot analyze data or make an experiment assuming it’s true.”

This result showed that antihydrogen and hydrogen are indeed both electrically neutral at a level 20 times more precise than before. Since the antiproton charge is also known to a similar precision, the collaboration also has improved the previous best precision on the positron charge by a factor of 25. While both results uphold the Standard Model, they have constrained what possible extensions to it could be.

Capra points out that this work addresses one piece of a larger puzzle. When comparing normal matter to antimatter, he says that “there is the piece comparing their charges, the piece comparing their light spectrums, and the piece comparing how they respond to gravity.” The latter piece will be investigated by a dedicated experiment, ALPHA-g, spearheaded by the University of Calgary and including the Canadian members of the collaboration.

Top, a diagram of the region where antihydrogen is synthesized and trapped in ALPHA. Bottom, a diagram of the electric potential in the trap region. Credit: Nature, copyright Macmillan Magazines 2010

The experiment was the first using the upgraded “ALPHA-2” system which began operation last year. The largest component, the cooling cryostat, was designed and built at TRIUMF and the University of Calgary by a team led by Mechanical Research Engineer Cam Marshall and Research Scientist (now Emeritus) Art Olin. Scientists at Simon Fraser University and the University of British Columbia also contributed to the construction and assembly of the ALPHA-2 apparatus, including the cryostat.

Marshall explained that “the cryostat houses a unique octopole magnet with the antimatter trap, into which was fed the laser spectroscopy system, microwave system, liquid helium cooling, super-conducting current leads, diagnostic wiring, and thermal shielding. A lot going on in a small space!” According to Olin, the experiment’s success was “facilitated by the stable cryogenic environment and higher trapping rate of this new atom trap.” The experiment was tricky because the team had to isolate the antihydrogen within a sophisticated “magnetic bottle” without it coming into contact with matter as it would then annihilate and disappear.

Having passed the first test of their upgraded apparatus with flying colours, the ALPHA Collobration is anxious to attack the other even more exciting pieces of the antimatter puzzle in the coming years.

“We will now look at the other pieces of the puzzle, such as the colour of the light emitted by antihydrogen, and test whether hydrogen and antihydrogen emit light in the same way,” says Capra. “We are also working on measuring the gravitational acceleration of antihydrogen and determining whether matter and antimatter have the same gravitational behaviour. The next several years are going to be very exciting.”

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For More Information:
The research, “An improved limit on the charge of antihydrogen from stochastic acceleration”, was published in the journal Nature at . High resolution images are available at the and websites.

About ALPHA-Canada
ALPHA is a collaboration of about 40 researchers from 40 researchers from Canada, the United Kingdom, Denmark, the United States, Sweden, Israel and Brazil. ALPHA-Canada consists of senior scientists, graduate students, and several professional staff from five Canadian institutions: The University of British Columbia, the University of Calgary, Simon Fraser University, TRIUMF and 91��ɫ. See

About 91��ɫ
is known for championing new ways of thinking that drive teaching and research excellence. Our 52,000 students receive the education they need to create big ideas that make an impact on the world. Meaningful and sometimes unexpected careers result from cross-discipline programming, innovative course design and diverse experiential learning opportunities. 91��ɫ students and graduates push limits, achieve goals and find solutions to the world’s most pressing social challenges, empowered by a strong community that opens minds. 91��ɫ U is an internationally recognized research university – our 11 faculties and 24 research centres have partnerships with 200+ leading universities worldwide. @91��ɫUnews

About TRIUMF
TRIUMF is Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics and accelerator-based science. We are an international centre for discovery and innovation, advancing fundamental, applied, and interdisciplinary research for science, medicine, and business. Owned and operated by a university consortium, TRIUMF trains and inspires future leaders in science and technology. Our laboratory is a hub for inquiry and ingenuity, a Canadian centre of excellence deeply integrated into the global scientific community. TRIUMF’s multidisciplinary team of roughly 500 staff and trainees collaborates with Canadian and international users who visit the laboratory to leverage our world-class facilities. Together, we drive compelling research and develop ideas and innovations that benefit humanity. @TRIUMFLab

Media Contacts:

Sandra McLean, 91��ɫ Media Relations, 416-736-2100 ext. 22097 /sandramc@yorku.ca

Marcello Pavan, TRIUMF, 604-222-7525 / Marcello@trumf.ca

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