Antimatter Hazard Symbol finds early adopters!

Credit: Ben McGee

Those who have been long-time readers will remember a proposition I made for an antimatter hazard symbol (otherwise and less formally called a “warning sign”) back in May of 2010, which was based on currently-accepted international hazard symbology and color schemes. 

Well, to date, I am excited to report that the symbol has found some early adopters across the cyberverse.  Foremost amongst these is the website, WeInterrupt.com, who made a stab at a somewhat technical, somewhat tongue-in-cheek article featuring the symbol last June.

Image credit: Armando/Redcrow Design, utilizing antimatter hazard symbol credit: Ben McGee

Much earlier, (a year ago last November,) the site “ParanoidNEWS.org” incorporated the symbol into a fairly fantastic, paranoid montage with a nuclear mushroom cloud (at right) cresting a somewhat crass article about the potential development of antimatter weaponry. 

Patently alarmist, and the color scheme was artistically distorted, but still a cool image.

Finally, in August, a blog called “AngelsDoSpeak” included the symbol in a breakdown of potential nuclear fallout or activity symbols.  (The purpose of the symbol’s inclusion here on a religious site was a little confusing or perhaps ominous, but I’m happy with adopters all the same.)

While I should note that there have been other internet-promoted proposals for an antimatter hazard symbol, I feel quite strongly (based on my current work in the radiological protection industry) that instead of attempting to promote a new glyph or design into the hazard iconograhy pantheon, any antimatter symbol should derive from internationally-recognized symbology already in place.  This symbol should then simply be evolved/modified to capture antimatter’s potential hazard as a highly-reactive source of radiative energy, which I believe the above symbol does quite nicely.

-And while this effort is admittedly precautionary, the recent discovery that the Earth’s magnetic field traps naturally-ocurring antiprotons into a belt (a la the Van Allen Radiation Belts) may make orbital harvesting of antimatter a plausible pursuit.

In any case, feel free to promote the hazard symbol or use in your own projects or research if you so desire, and as always, comments are welcome.

Summer Hits: Martian Water, Asteroid Nukes, Orbital Antimatter!

Here’s a recap of some of this summer’s greatest hits in space news that you might have missed:

Water on Mars

Dark streaks as summer flow features in Newton Crater, Mars. (Credit: NASA)

In an utterly tantalizing development, scientists analyzing imagery from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) have announced what appears for all the world to be direct evidence of water on Mars!

Because the MRO has been orbiting the Red Planet since 2006, it has been able to view the same portions of the world at different times of year with an eye toward spotting any potential seasonal changes.  This past August, the MRO team reviewing this growing dataset hit paydirt.

Specifically, the team identified dark streaks on the slopes of steep terrain in the southern hemisphere that are found during Martian spring and summer; these features disappear during Martian winter only to return once again the following spring.

While there are multiple possible explanations, the most likely amongst them appears to be the flow of briny (salty) groundwater that warms in the hotter months, breaches the surface, and evaporates/sublimates as it flows downhill.

Time will tell on this one, but all eyes should be on the possibility of subsurface briny Martian aquifers!

Russian “Armageddon”

Asteroid impact as depicted in the film "Deep Impact." (Credit: Paramount/Dreamworks)

This past August, Russian scientists took a note from Hollywood and seriously proposed the use of nuclear weapons as a means of asteroid mitigation.

Under the scenario, a dual-spacecraft architecture would be employed, with one spacecraft, called “Trap,” ferrying a nuclear warhead to the target while a second spacecraft, “Kaissa,” (apparently and intriguingly named after the mythical goddess of chess,) analyzes the target asteroid’s composition to determine the appropriate warhead use scenario (deflection vs. break-up).

The spacecraft would be lofted by a Soyuz-2 rocket and/or Russia’s upcoming Rus-M rocket.

While much contemporary research casts doubt on the ultimate effectiveness of a nuclear detonation in such a context, the proposers stressed that the technique would only be used on approaching objects up to 600 yards in diameter.

Orbital Antimatter Belt

Antiprotons trapped in the Earth's magnetic field (in pink). (Credit: Aaron Kaase/NASA/Goddard)

Also this past August, researchers published a stunning (but in retrospect, sensible) discovery in Astrophysical Journal Letters: Earth possess a natural orbiting belt of concentrated antiprotons.

Succinctly, the interactions of high-energy cosmic radiation with the Earth’s atmosphere can produce infinitesimal and ordinarily short-lived bursts of antimatter.  These antiparticles normally react with standard matter present around the Earth and annihilate.

However, in the near-vacuum of space beyond the bulk of the Earth’s atmosphere, some of these antimatter particles are spared immediate destruction.  Many of these antiprotons are then herded by the Earth’s magnetic field into bands or belts, which were recently discovered by the antimatter-hunting satellite PAMELA.

Aside from the “gee-whiz” factor, there are certain technical and economic reasons to get excited about the finding.  For starters, the energy density of antiprotons is on the order of a billion times greater than conventional chemical batteries.  However, at a current production cost on Earth of nearly $63 trillion per gram, antiprotons are a bit hard to come by and even less practical to use for anything other than research; Identifying a natural reservoir such as, say, a naturally-produced orbiting belt could open up additional avenues of use for antimatter as well as be immensely lucrative… if only one could solve the lightning-in-a-bottle problem of antimatter storage.

In any case, this is definitely something to keep an eye on.  For the less techno-jargon-inclined, news reports on the find may be found from the BBC as well as Science Magazine.