On Tue, Mar 30, 2010 at 10:40 AM, Medic <[email protected]> wrote: > > Am I the only one that thinks in the back of his mind that this (and not > Islam or global warming) will be what snuffs us (and half the surrounding > planets) out of existence? I mean I'm not making any sandwich boards with > the "The end is nigh" written on it, but it is a mild concern tucked in the > recesses of my mind. > > OR
It generates a strangelet particle. Talk about an evasive species lol! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strangelet Dangers If the strange matter hypothesis is correct and a strangelet comes in contact with a lump of ordinary matter such as Earth, it could convert the ordinary matter to strange matter.[12]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strangelet#cite_note-DDH-11> [13] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strangelet#cite_note-BJSW-12> This " ice-nine <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice-nine>" disaster scenario is as follows: one strangelet hits a nucleus, catalyzing its immediate conversion to strange matter. This liberates energy, producing a larger, more stable strangelet, which in turn hits another nucleus, catalyzing its conversion to strange matter. In the end, all the nuclei of all the atoms of Earth are converted, and Earth is reduced to a hot, large lump of strange matter. Good News! Accelerator production At heavy ion accelerators like RHIC<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativistic_Heavy_Ion_Collider>, nuclei are collided at relativistic speeds, creating strange and antistrange quarks which could conceivably lead to strangelet production. The experimental signature of a strangelet would be its very high ratio of mass to charge, which would cause its trajectory in a magnetic field to be extremely straight. The STAR collaboration<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STAR_detector>has searched for strangelets produced at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativistic_Heavy_Ion_Collider> ,[6] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strangelet#cite_note-5> but none were found. The Large Hadron Collider<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider>(LHC) is even less likely to produce strangelets, [7] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strangelet#cite_note-LSAGreport-6> but searches are planned[8]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strangelet#cite_note-7>for the LHC ALICE <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Large_Ion_Collider_Experiment>detector. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:314371 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
