How To Safely Contain a Literal Ton Of Antimatter.....

[Spacescifi]

It goes without saying that scifi will lean heavily on the side of fiction to solve this issue, but I tend to like to think real world solutions exist.

 

Here are my thoughts, you may correct me if I am wrong:

 

 

1. If you are accelerating in a large spaceship at 1g for hours with a literal ton of antimatter stored, the powered safety mechanisms and storage chamber will probably dwarf the weight of the ton of antimatter several times over. Perhaps the safety system may weigh 50 tons or more than the ton of antimatter... I don't know. I do think going lightweight on safety systems designed for a TON of antimatter is suicidal though... especially when under any sort of  high g constant acceleration.

 

2. Paradoxically I think the fact that storing large amounts of antimatter may require massive safety systems precludes the use of antimatter based missiles and bombs. Since a tiny system to contain antimatter can be easily breached and there goes your entire spaceship... never mind the fact that I do not know if a tiny containment system could cope with constant or sudden shifts in acceleration without failing. Nukes do not have that problem nor do chemical or fusion weapons. With antimatter you need extremely cold storage and precisely powered magnetic fields to contain the antimatter safely. In short... I am VERY skeptical that a magnetic containment field inside a DISPOSABLE small missile will have the power to contain anti-matter safely while accelerating at 30g. I think the higher the acceleration that is countered the more massive the power generators need to be for the magnetic field. Also perhaps the containment field would not be strong enough and thus fail, so that the moment you launch and light up your missile it will explode, leaving a punctured hole in your spaceship's hull as a parting gift for poor engineering design.

 

 

Thoughts?

Edited December 26, 2022 by Spacescifi

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

You can probably simplify this by asking how you can magnetically isolate a ton of normal matter... And then what the isolation architecture would have to look like if you want to accelerate it.  i.e. what kind of power do you need to give the magnets to resist the inertia of a ton of matter?  And how /or does it scale with the amount of acceleration you might demand. 

The problem is that you are asking for an answer based on current materials science - when your sci fi guys may have developed a way miniaturize a magnetic containment device.  

That is why handwavium is so powerful.  

[darthgently]

My handwavium would involve room temperature superconductors and hyperdense magiculum permanent magnets placed just so such  that they would lower the power requirements for the dynamic aspects of magnetic containment.

[Spacescifi]

35 minutes ago, darthgently said:

My handwavium would involve room temperature superconductors and hyperdense magiculum permanent magnets placed just so such  that they would lower the power requirements for the dynamic aspects of magnetic containment.

 

Hyper powerful permanent magnets on disposable missiles seems kind of... hard.

 

Even if you could make them handeling them would be problematic due to the high powered permanent magnetic field it self generates. Room temperature super conductors would seem arguably easier by comparison.

Edited December 26, 2022 by Spacescifi

[kerbiloid]

A Swiss bank. They store everything.

Also, it's far away and surrounded by mountains.

[magnemoe]

20 hours ago, Spacescifi said:

Hyper powerful permanent magnets on disposable missiles seems kind of... hard.

Even if you could make them handeling them would be problematic due to the high powered permanent magnetic field it self generates. Room temperature super conductors would seem arguably easier by comparison.

This and you still treat this as an very loose cannon. Now antimatter creates very good starship fuel and antimatter gas is an very good anti missile defense I doubt is usefulness as kiloton level explosives as nukes are so safe. Even have an feeling that directional nuclear blasts will win over antimatter for anti missiles, with the benefit that an hit did not turn you into plasma. 

[Spacescifi]

2 hours ago, magnemoe said:

This and you still treat this as an very loose cannon. Now antimatter creates very good starship fuel and antimatter gas is an very good anti missile defense I doubt is usefulness as kiloton level explosives as nukes are so safe. Even have an feeling that directional nuclear blasts will win over antimatter for anti missiles, with the benefit that an hit did not turn you into plasma. 

 

That is why I think the only real anti-matter weapons will be starships ramming into stuff and exploding.

Which is why you you need a fleet to protect your orbital space.

And the most effective way to take out an antimatter fueled starship trying to ram your planet just may be ramming it with another starship. Since ships like this can easily outrun nuclear and chemical missiles unless at close range.

Disabling it won't stop the debris from moving due to inertia, but if you can make it change course or hit it with enough force to negate it's inertia then you will have neutralized it as a threat.

The other way would be to first disable it, so it cannot maneuver, then swarm pound it with kinetics and missiles until it becomes an expanding cloud of plasma and debris that the atmosphere's friction should have no problem dealing with.

Edited December 27, 2022 by Spacescifi

[KSK]

In no particular order.

Can your antimatter containment system safely contain antimatter on Earth? If it can, then it can also deal with 1g constant acceleration, although you might also need to build in a decent safety factor to allow for jerk (rate of change of acceleration) if your spacecraft is likely to be making any rapid maneuvers.  I say 'might' because I honestly don't know how that would work but I'm drawing an analogy with structures designed to handle dynamic loads vs static loads.

I'm not sure that going lightweight on safety systems really matters that much vs going heavyweight. If the containment system fails and a ton of antimatter goes boom, then the mass of the containment system is essentially irrelevant. Quick calculation, 1000 kg of antimatter annihilates to release about 1.8x10²⁰J of energy or the equivalent of a 43 gigaton nuclear detonation (assuming  my powers of ten are all correct). Granted, that's not quite as dramatic as it sounds, since there won't be much of a blast wave in space but it's still a lot of energy to contain. Or, more likely, not contain.

That's not to say that the storage system will be lightweight, it's just that the mass of the storage system has no direct bearing on how safely it can store antimatter.

Miniaturizing an antimatter storage system for a missile might be a tricky engineering problem but the forces involved are likely to be small simply because of the smaller amounts of antimatter required.  For example, to accelerate a gram of antimatter (or anything else for that matter) at 30g, requires 0.9N of force, which is pretty trivial. See above for comments on dealing with jerk, which is going to be a lot more important for a missile.

[RCgothic]

I can't conceive any system that could safely contain a ton of antimatter on earth. Even a perfectly functional system would be a time bomb with a destructive energy in excess of 40 gigatons. The level of destruction from an accident would be continental in scale.

Plus in order to be magnetically containable it would need to be an antimatter *plasma*, and even the best confinement techniques we have for matter plasma leak. And if antimatter and matter come into contact they'll dump all their energy into the confinement system, which then rapidly disassembles.

Any anti-matter using civilisation would surely ban its planetary use.

[kerbiloid]

If distribute a tonne of antimatter between a billion of people, evry of them should holding just a milligram of the AM.

It can be charged and suspended in electrostatic field, like a magic souvenir.

As it will be slowly annihilating from random air molecules, it will be glowing.

So, it will be like a worldwide flashmob with a billion of glowing tokens on suits.

***

Dan Brown's design:

[RCgothic]

A tonne of antimatter divided a billion ways could power a billion candle-like heat outputs (80W) for around two billion seconds (~ 64 years).

But it would be far more likely to deliver a billion  instantaneous explosions each equal to about 40kg of TNT, or approximately 4 Javelin anti-tank missiles per person.

There's no kill like overkill.

[Hannu2]

On 12/26/2022 at 5:36 AM, Spacescifi said:

 

Hyper powerful permanent magnets on disposable missiles seems kind of... hard.

 

You can certainly buy disposable hypermagnets from the same shop from which you buy a ton of antimatter. There is a new year sale for magnetic monopoles going now. Take 3, pay 2. Please notice that shipping of antimatter may include longer delivery time and extra cost due to safety regulation.

[Hannu2]

On 1/1/2023 at 11:11 AM, RCgothic said:

I can't conceive any system that could safely contain a ton of antimatter on earth. Even a perfectly functional system would be a time bomb with a destructive energy in excess of 40 gigatons. The level of destruction from an accident would be continental in scale.

Plus in order to be magnetically containable it would need to be an antimatter *plasma*, and even the best confinement techniques we have for matter plasma leak. And if antimatter and matter come into contact they'll dump all their energy into the confinement system, which then rapidly disassembles.

If you could make anti-iron you could use ferromagnetism to handle it. It would be couple of orders of magnitude easier than handle plasma, but I would not like to live near antimatter storage.

Unfortunately there is no stable configuration of permanent magnets able to levitate an object. A simple control system is needed. It may not be simple to make sure that it work after blackout, earthquake, military attack and all attempts to maximize the profit with simplification of system.

 

On 1/1/2023 at 11:11 AM, RCgothic said:

Any anti-matter using civilisation would surely ban its planetary use.

Probably there is no need to store a ton of antimatter for any planetary use (except sterilize conquered planets from annoying semi-intelligent apes with nasty nuclear bombs). Large long term energy storage could use safer and more efficient methods (production of antimatter is very inefficient). Antimatter may still be allowed for small amounts if some technology needs very rapid release of energy.

[magnemoe]

On 1/1/2023 at 1:27 PM, kerbiloid said:

If distribute a tonne of antimatter between a billion of people, evry of them should holding just a milligram of the AM.

It can be charged and suspended in electrostatic field, like a magic souvenir.

As it will be slowly annihilating from random air molecules, it will be glowing.

So, it will be like a worldwide flashmob with a billion of glowing tokens on suits.

***

Dan Brown's design:

I thought it was 40 ton tnt for each,  so its not 4 small missiles its an heavy bomber loaded as hard as you get.  Only relevant as in its much higher chance you will set off other charges. 
And all the people trying to make personal antimatter power plants, fireworks or sell them off to people wanting to make bombs. 
Do not do this rather uplift raccoons

[kerbiloid]

26 minutes ago, magnemoe said:

I thought it was 40 ton tnt for each,  so its not 4 small missiles its an heavy bomber loaded as hard as you get.  Only relevant as in its much higher chance you will set off other charges. 
And all the people trying to make personal antimatter power plants, fireworks or sell them off to people wanting to make bombs. 
Do not do this rather uplift raccoons

That's why I wrote "a billion", not "eight". Only chosen.

[KSK]

2 hours ago, Hannu2 said:

If you could make anti-iron you could use ferromagnetism to handle it. It would be couple of orders of magnitude easier than handle plasma, but I would not like to live near antimatter storage.

Unfortunately there is no stable configuration of permanent magnets able to levitate an object. A simple control system is needed. It may not be simple to make sure that it work after blackout, earthquake, military attack and all attempts to maximize the profit with simplification of system.

The best component is no com.... *BOOM* 

Aka, 'move fast and vaporize things.'

At least anyone cutting corners with antimatter storage is only likely to cut them once. 

[TomKerbal]

Sorry to disappoint you: It is not possible to generate significant amounts of anti-matter (>1µg) and it is not possible to store it without disastrous losses (yet).

All particle accelerators on earth did not generate even a µg together yet (correct me if I am wrong).

These nice little traps are only capable of storing single (or a few) particles:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penning_trap

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadrupole_ion_trap

If you are trying to confine a macroscopic amount of particles (well, not 1t, but perhaps 10^9 particles of s.th., is it already a femto Gramm?) you are running into Coulomb scattering which is a big problem for particle confinement (since there is always a small part of particles you can not confine anymore, whatever you do). So in magnetic traps some plasma parts have loosen so much of their magnetic momentum that they will travel along magnetic fieldlines leaving the confinement cell. Cooling down everthing helps of course.

With matter it's often not that problem, because it does not hurt much (except a little bit of Bremsstrahlung) if electrons bang to the confinement walls. With antimatter... you know...

Since I left university many years ago their might be new achievements in the meantime (esp. in fusion research), and I would be very happy if someone has more promising and up-to-date  information.

[magnemoe]

On 1/18/2023 at 10:15 AM, TomKerbal said:

Sorry to disappoint you: It is not possible to generate significant amounts of anti-matter (>1µg) and it is not possible to store it without disastrous losses (yet).

All particle accelerators on earth did not generate even a µg together yet (correct me if I am wrong).

These nice little traps are only capable of storing single (or a few) particles:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penning_trap

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadrupole_ion_trap

If you are trying to confine a macroscopic amount of particles (well, not 1t, but perhaps 10^9 particles of s.th., is it already a femto Gramm?) you are running into Coulomb scattering which is a big problem for particle confinement (since there is always a small part of particles you can not confine anymore, whatever you do). So in magnetic traps some plasma parts have loosen so much of their magnetic momentum that they will travel along magnetic fieldlines leaving the confinement cell. Cooling down everthing helps of course.

With matter it's often not that problem, because it does not hurt much (except a little bit of Bremsstrahlung) if electrons bang to the confinement walls. With antimatter... you know...

Since I left university many years ago their might be new achievements in the meantime (esp. in fusion research), and I would be very happy if someone has more promising and up-to-date  information.

Think the idea here is that you add positrons and cool the anti hydrogen far down. But even if you had something like solid antimatter you could confirm inside an magnetic field. 
Yes its stable as long as the magnetic field hold, if it fails, air leaks in or in any case antimatter comes into contact with matter it will blow up. 
I rater work with something who combines nitroglycerin, chlorine trifluoride with the bonus that it detonate in contact with air and is highly radioactive, it still has the benefit that it don't release twice is mass as energy if something goes wrong. 
And I hope we get antimatter engines in KSP 2, they are crazy enough to use it. 
Still I think their safety rules for nuclear bombs are, keep them disarmed until ready to use.  They are radioactive and need to be treated as so if disposed or disassembled. Do not use in atmosphere of inhabited planets or near other ships or bases. 
Rules for antimatter is an long book. 

[TomKerbal]

15 hours ago, magnemoe said:

Think the idea here is that you add positrons and cool the anti hydrogen far down. But even if you had something like solid antimatter you could confirm inside an magnetic field. 
Yes its stable as long as the magnetic field hold, if it fails, air leaks in or in any case antimatter comes into contact with matter it will blow up. 
I rater work with something who combines nitroglycerin, chlorine trifluoride with the bonus that it detonate in contact with air and is highly radioactive, it still has the benefit that it don't release twice is mass as energy if something goes wrong. 
And I hope we get antimatter engines in KSP 2, they are crazy enough to use it. 
Still I think their safety rules for nuclear bombs are, keep them disarmed until ready to use.  They are radioactive and need to be treated as so if disposed or disassembled. Do not use in atmosphere of inhabited planets or near other ships or bases. 
Rules for antimatter is an long book. 

This is really amazing exiting topic. Do you have some references ?

You mean: Cooling down an anti hydrogen gas with additional positrons ? How on earth should that work ? Well, perhaps generating anti-protons and positrons in parallel with a (huge) particle accelerator, cooling it down instantly.... no. I can not imagine.

I do not know a electromagnetic trap (stable or not) that can hold a macroscopic amount of (anti-)matter for a  long time. Even under perfect conditions, due to the Coulomb scattering I already mentioned. It's just pure happy fantasy for me yet, but if I am wrong,  I would be very excited.

Perhaps this could be interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bose–Einstein_condensate . Storing some antimatter near absolute zero Kelvin. Hard to achieve. Not many particles.

How about storing solid anti matter by the way ? Just have a big anti matter - permanent magnet which just hovers above a  superconductor like it is shown here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superconductivity ? But because of sublimation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sublimation_(phase_transition) there will be always atoms leaving the material leading to *BAMM* . At nearly zero Kelvin ? Who knows. Perhaps. We should try :-D

ClF₃ ? Brutal combination of chlorine and fluorine. Comparing to that substance from hell C-Cl₄ (Tetra Chlormethane) is nearly harmless, it's only extremely carcinogenic. I know it personally. I  once had an accident with that substance (flowing over my hand). Happy, that I am still alive decades later :-)

 

 

[kerbiloid]

A single-particle blob of antiquarks (a superduperhyperon) held in magnetic field.

***

Btw, there is a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kugelblitz_(astrophysics).

1. Make a kugelblitz.

2. Let it evaporate.

3. Separate particle-antiparticle pairs with magnetic field.

...

4. Profit!!!

[TomKerbal]

1 hour ago, kerbiloid said:

A single-particle blob of antiquarks (a superduperhyperon) held in magnetic field.

***

Btw, there is a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kugelblitz_(astrophysics).

1. Make a kugelblitz.

2. Let it evaporate.

3. Separate particle-antiparticle pairs with magnetic field.

...

4. Profit!!!

Great ! Very interesting, I like it. Ball lightning... (the Germans again :-) ). Make it so ! Engage!

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, TomKerbal said:

Great ! Very interesting, I like it. Ball lightning... (the Germans again :-) ). Make it so ! Engage!

You see, everything is possible!

"Faith manages." (c) Lennier.

[Kerbart]

Who was it that wrote some SF novels with that concept in mind? Heinlein? Basically you hold your antimatter in containers made of antimatter and manipulate them with tools made of antimatter.

But what about the containers and tools? Well, unlike the anti-matter you want to handle, those  can be fitted with magnets made of antimatter, fixed in place by magnets made of regular matter.

Given that the nuclear bombs used in WW2 converted less than ½ g of matter into energy each*, one might question the sanity of those willing to work in the antimatter trade.

* Assuming "someone on the internet" got the math right)

 

[kerbiloid]

8 minutes ago, Kerbart said:

Given that the nuclear bombs used in WW2 converted less than ½ g of matter into energy each*

?

17.5 kt/kg U/Pu

15 kt = 0.86 kg

22 kt = 1.26 kg

Upd.
Got it. You mean the mass defect.

[Kerbart]

49 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

?

17.5 kt/kg U/Pu

15 kt = 0.86 kg

22 kt = 1.26 kg

That's the amount of fissable material involved, but that's just uranium and plutonium transforming into other elements (the sum of atomic numbers staying equal but the sum of the mass of those elements decreasing). The actual mass being converted into energy was far, far less.

 

According to Wikipedia, 1 kiloton of TNT represents 4.184×10¹² J, making 15 kT 6.27×10¹³ J.

Divide that by the speed of light (3.0×10⁸ m/s) squared (9×10¹⁶) and you get about 0.0007 kg. A little bit more than half a gram. So yes, I was off, but a lot closer than the 860 gram estimate.

Edited January 20, 2023 by Kerbart
Those exponents are confusing. Fixed c