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Air Force Researching Antimatter Weapons

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the build-a-bigger-gun dept.

mlmitton writes "The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that the Air Force is actively pursuing antimatter weapons. Such weapons would easy eclipse nuclear weapons in power, e.g., 1 gram of antimatter would equal 23 space shuttle fuel tanks of energy. Perhaps more interesting, after an initial inquiry by the Chronicle in the summer, the Air Force issued a gag order that prohibits any Air Force employee from discussing antimatter research or funding."

8 of 1,062 comments (clear)

  1. Really... by jsoffron · · Score: 5, Insightful

    isn't this a tremendous waste of money? I'm generally pretty high on national defense, but is our biggest national security threat really that nuclear bombs aren't powerful enough?

    We can not afford a mine shaft gap!

    1. Re:Really... by carpe_noctem · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This isn't the thing that's kept us from using nuclear weapons in the past. The thing that has is mutually assured destruction (or MAD, if you will).

      Nuclear weapons were successful in ending the second world war because we were the only country that had them at the time. We couldn't use them in any cold war conflicts because our enemies could use them on us.

      Likewise, the development of anti-matter weapons is useless too, because even if we develop the technology to use them, long-range nuclear weapons from our enemies can still be used against us.

      Creating more powerful weapons in an arms race is kind of like seeing who can count to the biggest number faster... I doubt we'll ever reach a largest number, and eventually both people will shout out "infinity plus one!".

      --
      "Quoting famous computer scientists out of context is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming." - K
  2. Funny the way the article is worded... by Weaselmancer · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that the Air Force is actively pursuing antimatter weapons. Such weapons would easy eclipse nuclear weapons in power, e.g., 1 gram of antimatter would equal 23 space shuttle fuel tanks of energy.

    Are we sure they're pursuing weapons? We are talking about the Air Force, and it's funny how they'd compare the relative energy to a spaceship fuel tank, of all things...

    --
    Weaselmancer
    rediculous.
  3. Not as spectacular as you think. by techno-vampire · · Score: 4, Insightful

    During a panel at LACon II in '84, Dr. Forward mentioned that calculations showed that an anti-matter bowling ball wouldn't go up in a blaze of light and gamma, it'd sit on the floor sizzling like a drop of water on a griddle for several minutes. From what I gathered, the matter and anti-matter only interact as they come into contact with each other, and even in a normal Earth atmosphere there's a limit as to how many particles touch at any given time. Also, of course, the reaction heats the air up, causing convection currents that lower the pressure. Thinking about it, I guess you'd get the fastest reaction with an anti-dust so that there's as much surface as possible.

    --
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  4. Re:How about research them... by nacturation · · Score: 4, Insightful

    But destructe research wins over constructive alternatives hands down.

    Given that matter + anti-matter is a purely destructive process to begin with, it isn't surprising that this is a key area of military research. On the brighter side, tons of everyday inventions funnel down from military funded projects, so it's not all doom and gloom.

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  5. Weapon research == Power plant research. by SatanicPuppy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So yea, woo hoo anti-matter power!

    Sure, it's radioactive, just like fission, but hey antimatter is cheap at $62.5 trillion per gram, and it's 10-100 times more powerful!

    Not sure what the point would be in antimatter weapons, besides serious coolness. Nukes are at least stable at room temperature, and if you drop a ball of plutonium on your foot, all you get is broken toes. Wouldn't want to have a power failure anywhere NEAR antimatter.

    --
    ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
  6. Re:Energy Conversion by Egonis · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How about using this kind of power for POSITIVE purposes? Like low-cost, efficient, and safe energy?

  7. Ding! by mikeee · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think you've got it. Consider that space shuttle.

    It's something like 95% fuel by weight on takeoff. Now, if your engines are burning antimatter, you can replace all that weight with payload and still reach orbit!

    If the antimatter could be manufactured for a reasonable multiple of the energy cost, it would cause the cost of getting stuff into space to drop dramatically.