Life imitates art: In a first, antimatter to be moved in lorry across Europe

Antimatter will be moved for the first time in a lorry across Europe.

Nature journal reported on this planned scientific feat, which has a fictional precursor in Dan Brown's Angels & Demons.

In the novel, turned into a movie starring Tom Hanks, terrorists stole a canister of antimatter from the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) with the intention of blowing up the Vatican.

This would not have been a far-fetched task, given that antimatter -- when it comes in contact with normal matter -- ensures that both are annihilated and the result i a powerful burst of electromagnetic radiation.

Of course, this makes the transportation tricky as well, but one must carefully combine sets of powerful electrical and magnetic fields in special devices to ensure the antimatter can be stored in a safe way.

This unusual scientific journey becomes even more important when one considers that antimatter is the most expensive material on earth -- with an estimated cost of several trillion dollars to make just a gram. Further, it can only be made in particle physics labs like the one at the CERN research centre near Geneva.

Professor Stefan Ulmer, a professor there, told The Guardian “That makes moving it around very difficult, though we are now close to making our first journey. Antimatter has so much to tell us. That is why we are doing this."

Scientists have assured that this journey has none of the risks outlined in the Dan Brown novel since the quantities transported will not be sufficient for an explosion of any recognisable nature.

Ulmer noted that scientists want to study these particles as they are of the belief that antimatter might hold the solution to a fundamental puzzle.

"We believe the big bang produced the same amounts of matter and antimatter. These should have annihilated each other, leaving a universe made of electromagnetic radiation and not much else," Ulmer told the publication.

CERN scientist Barbara Maria Latacz said that the aim is to understand 'why we exist'.

While matter is made up of protons and electrons, antimatter has antiprotons and positrons or antielectrons. Measuring the properties of antiprotons precisely and comparing them with protons could reveal the small hidden differences that might explain why matter has thrived at the expense of antimatter. This is known as the Base Experiment.

Currently, background magnetic fields near the device used to carry out the experiment are causing impediments, which is why scientists want to move the samples to other labs.

"By moving them to a new location, we can make measurements that are 100 times more accurate and get a deeper understanding of antiprotons," Ulmer explained.

Scientists, to make this transportation possible, have made devices which have superconducting magnets and come with cryogenic cooling systems as well as vacuum chambers where the antiprotons can be trapped so they don't come in contact with normal matter. Then they will be carried on seven-tonne lorries.

While the antimatter will initially be moved within CERN, the aim is to move to a dedicated precision lab at Dusseldorf's Heinrich Heine University over the next year.

The head of the transport project told the British publication that the long-term plan was to be able to move it to any lab in Europe, with the hope scientists can find why antimatter all but disappeared from the universe. Ulmer posited it could be a 'gamechanger'.