This week I care for two interns (from a Cologne school, 15+16 years old) in our Lab!
Part of their job here is to measure the traces of the reactor accident in Tchernobyl in 1986, that can still be seen in the gamma-ray spectra of some earth-samples (especially one sees Cs-137, that has a half-live of 30 years). To measure the spectra they use a superconductor counter (Ge)…
As I described some effects that may happen in such a detector due to the radiation, I told them about Positrons, that are Anti-Electrons. I told them, that after a Positron is produced it annihilates with the next best Electron and we measure gamma-rays (with the popular energy of 511 keV).
They never heard, that Antimatter is doing this annihilation, (neither they don’t know Star Trek!)—so one of their questions was “Why do Positrons and Electrons annihilate anyway?”…
Puh, … Pretty good question! I never really thought about it! For me it was clear (big problem for a scientist, isn’t it?)
Anyway—I found this and that it is more a philosophical question… Like almost everything, that seems to be clear for us?!
Cheers,
Thomas
They got nice clips on that site!
I’m in the middle of introducing a new cosmologic model that actually supplies a new understanding of how annihilations occur using a modified version of Einstein’s well-known (almost cliche) checkerboard graphic of space-time.
The model I am advancing is based on a deductive analysis of the repercussions of a single hypothetical premise: the idea that matter and antimatter gravitationally repel.
Specifically concerning annihilation go to: http://www.scientificconcerns.com/Forums/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=776&start=98
If you’re interested in the new model, though not interest in that banter of some on that thread, some simplified articles concerning the new model is at www.hasanuddin.org
Or if you’re really interested, the full book, The Dominium, is available at online bookstores