converting energy to matter

The Large Hadron Collider, the most powerful proton smasher in the world, includes the ATLAS detector, one of the LHC’s four particle detectors. (image: CERN)

On page 169 of the third in the series (Sharon of Two Salems: All the World's a Stage) is the following passage:

BLAM, BLAM, BLAM! The discharges from outer space struck the enclosed trailer that Claire had quickly constructed.... Inside the trailer a dense battery grew, as the energy from Sharon’s lightning was converted to mass. It fell to Sharon to make the battery large enough to fill the U-Haul—and to do so quickly. Claire had calculated ten strikes would be just right, and if the last one was even a little bit too much, the excess energy would dissipate into the air, rather than letting the battery break the struts on the inside of the trailer.

What happens here takes a huge leap of imagination. The idea of someone being able to call lightning down from the sky with their mind will be discussed in another post (!), for there is some news to report on the other topic touched on here: the conversion of energy into mass.

The state of research on this science is in its infancy. Right now, it's going to take an experiment with the LHC (the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva) that will use an enormous amount of energy to hopefully produce an almost immeasurably small amount of mass. From Science Daily:

First proton collisions at world's largest science experiment should start in early June

Date:

April 28, 2015

Source:

Southern Methodist University

Summary:

First collisions of protons at the world's largest science experiment should start the first or second week of June. The LHC restarted is second run in early April. There are no significant signs of new physics yet, but DeRoeck said it will take only one significant deviation in the data to change everything.

To make it clear why this will help in this area of research, the following explanation is from an article posted a year ago on the website of London's Imperial College:

Scientists discover how to turn light into matter after 80-year quest

Imperial physicists have discovered how to create matter from light - a feat thought impossible when the idea was first theorised 80 years ago. 

In just one day over several cups of coffee in a tiny office in Imperial’s Blackett Physics Laboratory, three physicists worked out a relatively simple way to physically prove a theory first devised by scientists Breit and Wheeler in 1934. 

Breit and Wheeler suggested that it should be possible to turn light into matter by smashing together only two particles of light (photons), to create an electron and a positron – the simplest method of turning light into matter ever predicted. The calculation was found to be theoretically sound but Breit and Wheeler said that they never expected anybody to physically demonstrate their prediction. It has never been observed in the laboratory and past experiments to test it have required the addition of massive high-energy particles... 

The new research, published in Nature Photonics, shows for the first time how Breit and Wheeler’s theory could be proven in practice. This ‘photon-photon collider’, which would convert light directly into matter using technology that is already available, would be a new type of high-energy physics experiment. This experiment would recreate a process that was important in the first 100 seconds of the universe and that is also seen in gamma ray bursts, which are the biggest explosions in the universe and one of physics’ greatest unsolved mysteries.

 

more thoughts on computerized glasses

The computerized glasses that Claire makes for Sharon are able to do something that we can only hope will eventually be a feature of the glasses that will be on the market:

Promotional image via Magic Leap

From the third book of Sharon of Two Salems, page 40:

“How many fountains do you think have ever been here in City Hall Park?” she asked Ellen, taking her glasses off to get an unobstructed view of the park without words and names of things floating everywhere.

“I think your friend knows the answer to that better than I do,” Ellen laughed, jostling her baby as she talked. “Claire, is that something you’ve come across in your studies—how many fountains there were here?”

Claire cleared her throat a little too loudly, causing Sharon to look over at her. That didn’t even sound human, she thought.

Claire stared at Sharon and tapped the corner of her thick, horn-rimmed glasses.

Oh, she wants me to put my glasses back on. As Sharon did so, she turned back to Ellen and said apologetically, “I’m really blind without these.”

The second they were on, Claire said, “In 1842, the Croton Fountain was built there.” She pointed to a plaque set in the stone walkway, not far from where they stood. Immediately a colossal fountain appeared in Sharon’s glasses.

She stepped back and stifled a gasp. It partially enveloped a side of the present-day fountain, was much larger, and had spectacular jets of water. It looks like a painting, though, Sharon thought, and the water isn’t moving.

It'll be one thing to have text displayed in the first version of Google Glass, but what about images displayed related to the location one is at? And not only just that, but also having the images "stay in place" (relative to the landscape) as the wearer moves his/her head around?

I found this on Gizmodo: "How Magic Leap Is Secretly Creating a New Alternate Reality." At the time the article was written last November, they were already speculating this kind of visual phenomenon (the animation above is from Magic Leap).

The writer, Sean Hollister, says:

If the results of my digging are correct, this is what Magic Leap intends to build: a Google Glass on steroids that can seamlessly blend computer-generated graphics with the real world. A headset packed with fiber optic projectors, crazy lenses, and loads of cameras. An augmented reality that you'll actually believe in.

Having this kind of functionality would revolutionize museum tours, and turn outdoor environments into museums as well (as happened for Sharon in the excerpt above, when a painting of the fountain that used to exist is superimposed over its original location). Conceivably, voice commands and eye movements could make the tour interactive.

Go to Magic Leap's website! The images they have there are SPECTACULAR. To be honest with you, I can't wait!

virtual reality suits, continued...contacts or headset glasses?

Also from the first book of Sharon of Two Salems, on page 102:

"You’ll want to do your face last because as soon as the face part is activated, you’ll be looking out through the robotic form’s eyes, and that will line up your eardrums at the same time for sound.”

Sharon is being instructed how to put on the virtual reality suit, which in this case consists of invisible force fields. Since this is the first time she's put it on, they've tinted the VR suit a transparent purple to make it easier for her to put it on. What she sees is a mold of her own body, except she's looking at the inside of it. 

Once her eyes touch the eyeball shapes of the form, it as if she's put contacts on and she sees only the visual information coming through the suit...the visuals also correspond to which direction she looks. 

So, again, we have to take a step back because we're nowhere near developing a force field that can transmit information from another environment, much less even one that can protect someone from shock waves (see this Wired Magazine article, "That Boeing Force Field? It Probably Won’t Ever Work"). Let's look at where the VISUALS for virtual reality suits actually are at this point, though:

1. From the website for Manufacturing Global: "...Smart contact lenses may do a lot more interesting things down the road, and Google has been researching the capabilities for quite some time. Now it has a new patent related to making them." (The patent describes the micro-architecture of the proposed lenses, but doesn't explain what each thing does.)
2. Virtual reality glasses, or headsets, have been out for a longer time, and have come a long way from the early models. See "Why Samsung’s Gear VR is a virtual reality game-changer." From the article: "You’d think they had just discovered electricity or an alternative universe. In some ways, they had. The teens jumped around, yelped with excitement, and didn’t want to stop playing a few basic flight games and watching movies in the virtual reality theater."                                                 
                                              
   An attendee tries an Oculus-powered Samsung Gear VR headset during the French telecom Orange annual company's innovations show in Paris Oct. 2, 2014. (REUTERS/Charles Platiau)
    
3. And, of course, Google Glass has been mentioned in a previous post. The difference between previous prototypes of Google Glass and Google's contact lenses in #1, above, may in fact be that the contacts will still be designed to see THROUGH, with information superimposed in the wearer's field of vision. But what will stop Google from adding a feature where the contacts become opaque, and the wearer is seeing only the virtual reality set he or she is interacting with?

the first of several posts on virtual reality suits

From the first book of Sharon of Two Salems, on page 101:

“Here’s the VR suit,” Alice said.

“Where?” Sharon asked.

“It’s invisible—it’s just a force field that wraps around your body. And that section of floor moves in all four directions as you walk on it. It will also tilt and incline with the same angle of the floor the virtual reality robotic form is walking on at that moment. Here, why don’t you try it?”

Sharon steeled herself and gingerly stepped onto the square area. Nothing happened. So far, so good, she thought.

“Now try walking,” Alice instructed.

Sharon took a shaky step forward. The foot behind her slid backward, though, and she found herself in exactly the same place in the center of the panel.

Feeling a little braver, she walked normally. The material of the panel moved right along with her steps, and she stayed exactly in the same place. She even turned a little, and it easily accommodated that movement.

A virtual reality setup that includes being able to walk in place--while the visuals through the glasses show the participant walking to a new location--is in development.

The Virtuix Omni™ evolves virtual reality one step further, allowing anyone to stand up and traverse virtual worlds with the natural use of their own feet. Walking and running in virtual reality creates an unprecedented sense of immersion. 

It will be interesting to see the final product. Here are some more details:

The Omni uses a concave platform that enables a smooth, natural gait and an immersive walking and running motion. Comfortable Omni shoes allow for extended gameplay and fast-paced battlefield action. A robust support ring and unattached support harness provide maximum safety and versatility for rapid, unconstrained movements. Walk, run, jump, and turn swiftly and smoothly in 360 degrees without restraints. 

 In Sharon of Two Salems, force fields surrounding the body provide the "safety net" so that the person in the suit can't fall off of the panel. However, we're still a ways from creating something remotely like a force field, much less one that would cushion up gently to one's arms and legs. 

It will be interesting to find out how the safety features on the Omni work to prevent falling, including the "unattached support harness," as they get ready to roll out this product. 

A vacuum for radioactive emissions?

On page 120 of the second volume of Sharon of Two Salems:

She looked down at her robotic form, and it had no colors emanating from it to the orb. Her form could function in close proximity to the sphere because it depended on plain old electricity to run. That part still didn’t make sense to Sharon. If the orb was vacuuming up something as powerful as radioactive emissions, why weren’t the lesser forms of electromagnetic radiation being sucked up, too? However, this was a good thing; their electrically powered robotic forms wouldn’t function if the orb suddenly started absorbing regular old electricity as well.

The assumption in this paragraph is that there could be some undiscovered field of physics that would allow for radioactive emissions pouring in all directions from a source to be somehow deflected or "bent"...without affecting other forms of electromagnetic radiation. Also the assumption is that the orb absorbing the radioactivity wouldn't affect physical matter, either.

It is know that very heavy objects in deep space (such as a compact cluster of galaxies) can cause a phenomenon called "gravitational lensing." The light from objects behind the heavy mass is actually bent as it passes by. To us here on Earth, looking through our telescopes at places in space this is occurring at results in us seeing a visual distortion of the object behind. Here's a classic example:

Strong gravitational lens LRG 3-757

From Wikipedia:

What's large and blue and can wrap itself around an entire galaxy? A gravitational lens mirage. Pictured above, the gravity of a luminous red galaxy (LRG) has gravitationally distorted the light from a much more distant blue galaxy. More typically, such light bending results in two discernible images of the distant galaxy, but here the lens alignment is so precise that the background galaxy is distorted into a horseshoe -- a nearly complete ring.

The "orbs" in Sharon of Two Salems have been written to be about as big as a super large beach ball. If something that size could not only bend rays of radioactivity but suck them into itself as well, it would be more powerful than the strongest gravitational lenses we can see in space. Remember, we can still see the objects behind the "lenses"--but in the story, the radioactivity is completely diverted to the orb and consumed by it (the latter will be a topic for a future blog post).

The orb would have to be gravitationally more powerful than the largest objects (or clusters of objects) in space, yet smaller than a car. In this universe, I (the author) have to admit that's physically impossible. Not only would radiation be swept up into it, but light and physical objects as well. In fact, it would be a black hole...easily sucking up the entire earth, all the other planets and their moons, and the sun. It's "event horizon" would extend well beyond the reaches of the Kuiper Belt, and it would probably consume those space rocks as well.

But it is fiction we're talking about...I just haven't thought of a good MADE-UP way to explain it...