Chapter 783: Magnetic Confinement
Translator: _Min_ Editor: Caron_
It was a wonderful phenomenon.
A blue light ball floated inside a transparent vacuum tube about the thickness of a wrist. At closer examination, it was possible to see electron beams between the two ends of the photosphere and the two ends of the vacuum tube.
The vacuum tube was placed on Lin Lin’s experiment bench.
It was Jiang Chen’s first time seeing antimatter
To be honest, when he saw the real thing, it was still different from what he expected. He originally thought that antimatter should be dark, so he didn’t expect it to be somewhat dazzling.
“This is antimatter?” Jiang Chen pointed to the vacuum tube while looking at Lin Lin next to him.
Lin Lin stared at him with a gaze that said ‘idiot’ in her eyes. She coughed before she began to display her wealth of knowledge.
“…plasma with a dense core formed in an absolute vacuum metal tube, using an electron beam injected through small regular angular momentum.”
“Plasma?” Blasted by many technical terms, Jiang Chen felt his head was getting jammed with terms he couldn’t comprehend.
Lin Lin, however, seemed to enjoy his confusion. It was even more obvious when a sly smile formed on her face.
“Yes, you can think of this glowing light sphere as a ‘sh.e.l.l’ wrapped around the antimatter. In the center of this ‘vacuum sphere’ is an extremely dark particle that oscillates randomly. That’s what’s commonly called antimatter. We usually call this method magnetic confinement.”
Lin Lin also added a sentence with a smirk.
“Although it’s just one gram, it can instantly wipe this region off the map.”
Jiang Chen’s eyebrows jumped, but he didn’t look as afraid as Lin Lin imagined.
“…are there no safety issues by just placing it here?”
“There’s no need to worry about safety. The plasma sphere is stable or can even be described to be perfect… It’s confusing. How did the guys in the void do it?”
“It’s impossible to achieve this with 22nd-century technology?” Jiang Chen looked at Lin Lin, somewhat surprised.
Lin Lin shook her head.
“Disregarding the formation of such a peculiar plasma sphere, creating an absolute vacuum in this vacuum tube isn’t an easy task for the 22nd century. You must know that even the universe isn’t an absolute vacuum. Aside from matter we can see, there’s dark matter we can’t see. It’s definitely not an easy task to get rid of these things to create an absolute vacuum.”
After a pause, Lin Lin murmured as she fixated on this vacuum tube.
“Although atoms are electrically neutral, they have a weak magnetic distance. It’s also the same for antimatter, the opposite of matter. By using a special magnetic field, antimatter can be confined to a certain s.p.a.ce. Surprising design… Although human observations of antimatter can be traced back to the 20th century, no one could store antimatter in plasma until two centuries after.”
“What about using antimatter as a weapon?” Jiang Chen immediately asked the question he was most concerned about.
“The power is amazing, but I advise you not to use the weapon belonging to the interstellar era on Earth.” Lin Lin glanced at him. “In theory, there are no defenses against antimatter; any positive matter that comes into contact with antimatter will be rapidly annihilated. 100% of the ma.s.s will be converted into energy and released as high-energy gamma rays. By the way, hydrogen bombs have only 0.7% of its ma.s.s conversion. To destroy the earth, only about one kilogram of antimatter needs to fall to the ground. This is why antimatter is listed as a prohibited research project.”
After Lin Lin’s explanation, Jiang Chen knew why the Remnants of the Void compared this to the last hope.
It possessed terrifying lethality. If they could possess antimatter weapons, then human civilization might gain a fighting chance against Harmony 20.5 lightyears away.
Lin Lin reminded him in a quiet voice when she saw how moved Jiang Chen was.
“But you shouldn’t get too excited. The Remnants of the Void only give us a sample. The manufacturing process or the related technology, our foundation is zero.”
“Start from zero? No problem, I believe in your abilities!” Jiang Chen laughed and patted Lin Lin’s shoulder. “Antimatter research will be handed to you!”
“Don’t give me everything! I’m still researching the subject you gave me about interdimensional travel! Even if it’s me, I have zero background in antimatter? I suggest you find some scientists with research background in physics. Moreover, it’s very dangerous to research this on the surface. It’s better to research and extract antimatter in outer s.p.a.ce,” Lin Lin protested.
Lin Lin didn’t have any more understanding of antimatter, but she still helped Jiang Chen design a research path.
Divide the topic into three parts.
The first part was to study how to make an absolute vacuum container for the storage of plasma wrapped with antimatter.
The second part was to study how to make such plasma capable of magnetic confinement of antimatter used for wrapping antimatter.
The third part was to study how to use high-energy particle colliders to produce antimatters more efficiently and collect them with magnetic fields before decaying.
In fact, producing antimatter would be the simplest step. After all, in 2014, the European Organization for Nuclear Research succeeded in creating an anti-hydrogen atom beam. It was an antimatter beam up to 2.7 meters made of 80 antihydrogen atoms, but no one managed to preserve and produce it on a large scale.
These high-energy ion accelerators could typically only produce a few nanograms of antihydrogen atoms per year, and one nanogram was one billionth of a gram.
After leaving Lin Lin’s lab, Jiang Chen went to the community center and sent the doc.u.ments for the establishment of a new research project team to w.a.n.g Qing.
“Acquire the missing talents from the fallout shelters, mark the physics research labs near Suzhou and Hangzhou, and the Expeditionary Army will be responsible for recycling the technology.”
“Antimatter?” w.a.n.g Qing was completely bewildered by the doc.u.ments in her hands, but since the general made this request, she nodded. “Okay, I’ll make the order right away. Right, some time ago, there were some news from Hongcheng.”
“Hongcheng? What news?”
“Compared to before, the activities of the merchants in the Northern Alliance Area and Qingshan Town increased substantially. At the same time, Wu Wei, President of the Steel Gear Chamber of Commerce, also reported that merchants from the Northern Alliance Area were active in the area. They were buying steel, rare earth, and electronic components while lacking interest in other goods.”
“Purchasing steel?” Jiang Chen thought for a moment and looked at w.a.n.g Qing. “Increase the conversion ratio of credits with crystals. Allow the crystal farms controlled by us to increase the output of crystals.”
With the depreciation of crystals, the Northern Alliance Area merchants who purchased steel would see an increase in cost. Although this would affect the NAC’s local economy to a certain extent, it could effectively curb the outflow of strategic resources caused by the market economy.
“In addition, increase orders for military factories on Sixth Street. Be sure to double the production output before the end of this year!”
Jiang Chen then said after a long pause..
“Finally, be prepared for a war.”