Naked Science Forum
Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: ...lets split up... on 20/11/2009 07:38:02
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I am wondering why there is an excess of positive matter in the universe?
I've thumb sucked my own unsupported ideas but i am interested in any other theories as to why this is.
Much appreciated.
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You already know a theory of mine, so yeh this should be an intetesting discussion.
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This is anyone's guess, so I'll state a speculative notion that I came up with a week or so ago.
The most elemental particles of matter are always created in pairs, one positive, one negative as in an electron and a positron. Constituents of nuclei are smaller more energetic electron-like particles, again, created in pairs. These smaller particles can come together to form atomic nuclei, or decay back to pure energy.
A proton consists of three such particles. This is an odd number. One partner of a pair is left out. The left-out partner becomes pure energy. So we have pair creation, but single particle inhalation.
This is the cause of the dominance of normal matter over antimatter.
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fphotontheory.com%2Fvern.gif&hash=c22996c1b3c68c693722af86eb9eafb9)
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I am wondering why there is an excess of positive matter in the universe?
I've thumb sucked my own unsupported ideas but i am interested in any other theories as to why this is.
Much appreciated.
The official answer is: we don't know.
A more detailed answer is that there is some physical principle at work in high energy physics such that at some point, more positive matter was created than anti-matter.
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I am wondering why there is an excess of positive matter in the universe?
I've thumb sucked my own unsupported ideas but i am interested in any other theories as to why this is.
Much appreciated.
The official answer is: we don't know.
A more detailed answer is that there is some physical principle at work in high energy physics such that at some point, more positive matter was created than anti-matter.
yes spontaneous symmetry breaking, but i think verns idea was neet.
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The currently favoured reason is a small asymmetry which has been observed in the decay products of B mesons which were important in the very early stages of the big bang.
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You already know a theory of mine, so yeh this should be an intetesting discussion.
This is an excellent question, and i want you to post this in the forum, with my added suggestion of the inequality.
Recently, there was discovered a black region (not of a black hole configuration) but one which was devoid of matter and energy... give or take a few loose particles that must be around, fluctuating from the vacuum. Anyhow, this hole was far too big and still is remaining a paradox against the big bang theory for it stretched for millions of lightyears, and no theoretical explanation can suffice. If the big bang theorists where so adiment towards the math, then why is the observation of this hole so evident and most of all unpredicted?
My guess, is that there was no spontaneous symmetry breaking, but rather a very cleverly orchestrated gravitational twist near the beginning of time (about 4 billion years after expansion) finally had a massive burst of energy, where most of the antimatter in the universe dissipated back to radiative energy (photons). It seems that this early collision is a theory at best, but one which works well if quantum physics big bang enthusiasts wish to keep their theory alive.
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I assume you're talking about matter and anti-matter here.
As well as the observed asymmetry that SoulSurfer has pointed out, for the amount of matter to perfectly equal the amount of anti-matter precisely equal amounts of both would have needed to have been created and considering the scale of the universe, and the chaotic conditions of the Big Bang, this seems very unlikely to me.
Another possible mechanism is to view the BB in a very simplified and abstract way: imagine it as starting with a single abstract value, which then subdivides, producing +ve and -ve results, to start creating and filling the universe. If the single value that we start with is odd, let's say 3, then the first subdivision, from one to three items, cannot result in a perfectly equal balance as there'll be one left over. In this model, the actual observed baryon asymmetry is equivalent to a starting value of 1000000001 (decimal).
Then finally, there's the issue of needing all of the matter to come into contact with all of the antimatter, when the expansion of the universe means that everything is moving away from each other i.e. you could start with perfect balance but end up with the two members of a matched pair traveling in opposite directions, and so never meeting.
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I am wondering why there is an excess of positive matter in the universe? I've thumb sucked my own unsupported ideas but I am interested in any other theories as to why this is. Much appreciated.
There isn't! Leaving out photons and neutrinos, all the stable matter of the universe consists of electrons and protons. There are of course neutrons too, but outside a nucleus they suffer beta-minus decay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_decay) in about ten minutes and turn into a proton, an electron, and an antineutrino. There's also positrons and antiprotons, but they soon encounter their antiparticle and annihilate, leaving our world full of electrons and protons. As far as we can tell, there's the same number of each.
You might say the protons are much heavier than the electrons, and in this respect there is more positively charged matter than negatively charged matter. But I suspect what you're really angling at is this:
"Electrons and protons are matter, whilst positrons and antiprotons are antimatter. Why is there an excess of matter in the universe?"
When you ask this question, you're missing a trick, and it's obvious when you think about it. Here's the $64,000 dollar question:
"Given a choice between the electron and the positron, which does the proton more closely resemble?"
The answer is the positron. And if the positron is antimatter, that means the proton is antimatter too, and that changes everything. Think of the early universe as a game of tennis, with matter fighting antimatter in an orgy of creation and destruction. People normally think of this as a game where the matter is on one side playing against the antimatter on the other side, like two men playing doubles against two women. It isn't like that. It was a game of mixed doubles. It was matter+antimatter v antimatter+matter. The quartet obviously isn't stable, but all you need is a chance excess of one over the other, and this excess will grow and grow via what's called a "stability tip".
This viewpoint puts the mockers on the much-touted "mystery of the missing antimatter". A proton is 1837 times as massive as the electron, so we're mostly made of the stuff.
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Amazingly, that makes less sense than your other posts. At least one word in that post must be wrong.
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As ever, PhysBang contributes nothing, and can only carp at those who do. He's a self-appointed member of the thought-police, he doesn't have any answers, and he attempts to stifle discussion and debate in case somebody else does.
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And if the positron is antimatter, that means the positron is antimatter too,
I suspect you meant that the proton is antimatter too. You have seen my pet universe scheme, so you know I wouldn't suspect that is so.
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Duly corrected, Thanks Vern. I've seen your photon theory, is that what you meant? I envisage the proton as a trefoil photon, the "next knot" up from the electron, with charge being merely a matter of chirality. Whether something is classed as matter or antimatter is down to rarity rather than actual particle properties. And since we don't wonder where all the l-glucose (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L-Glucose) is, I tend to see "the mystery of antimatter" as something that is over-promoted by institutions courting public funding, with media outlets being overly compliant. See http://www.newscientist.com/special/antimatter-mysteries as an example. Does antimatter fall up? Ye Gods.
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I am wondering why there is an excess of positive matter in the universe? I've thumb sucked my own unsupported ideas but I am interested in any other theories as to why this is. Much appreciated.
There isn't! Leaving out photons and neutrinos, all the stable matter of the universe consists of electrons and protons. There are of course neutrons too, but outside a nucleus they suffer beta-minus decay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_decay) in about ten minutes and turn into a proton, an electron, and an antineutrino. There's also positrons and antiprotons, but they soon encounter their antiparticle and annihilate, leaving our world full of electrons and protons. As far as we can tell, there's the same number of each.
You might say the protons are much heavier than the electrons, and in this respect there is more positively charged matter than negatively charged matter. But I suspect what you're really angling at is this:
"Electrons and protons are matter, whilst positrons and antiprotons are antimatter. Why is there an excess of matter in the universe?"
When you ask this question, you're missing a trick, and it's obvious when you think about it. Here's the $64,000 dollar question:
"Given a choice between the electron and the positron, which does the proton more closely resemble?"
The answer is the positron. And if the positron is antimatter, that means the proton is antimatter too, and that changes everything. Think of the early universe as a game of tennis, with matter fighting antimatter in an orgy of creation and destruction. People normally think of this as a game where the matter is on one side playing against the antimatter on the other side, like two men playing doubles against two women. It isn't like that. It was a game of mixed doubles. It was matter+antimatter v antimatter+matter. The quartet obviously isn't stable, but all you need is a chance excess of one over the other, and this excess will grow and grow via what's called a "stability tip".
This viewpoint puts the mockers on the much-touted "mystery of the missing antimatter". A proton is 1837 times as massive as the electron, so we're mostly made of the stuff.
Farsight, could you try and be a bit more... I don't know what the word is that i am looking for..
... serious - that's it, serious.
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Farsight, could you try and be a bit more... I don't know what the word is that i am looking for..
... serious - that's it, serious.
Seriously, one has to be insane to say that a proton is anything like a positron, so i don't know what you're hoping for here.
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...And if the positron is antimatter, that means the proton is antimatter too...
What utter nonsense.
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Thanks for the replies. I also find it hard to believe a proton is anti-matter,
And if the positron is antimatter, that means the proton is antimatter too.
just because A is like B, doesn't mean A has all the same qualities as B.
Personally i always felt there were two universes (or is it universii?), that look like two light cones joined at the same origin going in different directions. One anti-matter and one matter.
But admittedly i don't know the heavy science/ maths stuff, i work with what i got. And it might just be a compulsive obsessive thing to balance my ideas.