Logic tells us that antimatter should have annihilated the Universe. So why hasn’t it?
In 1928, the UK physicist Paul Dirac stumbled on an equation that seemed to show that, for every particle, there’s another, nearly identical particle with an opposite electric charge. Just four years later, the US physicist Carl David Anderson proved Dirac’s prediction correct by capturing a picture of a ‘positron’ – a particle with the same size and mass as an electron, but with a positive charge rather than a negative one.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
This rapid series of developments unlocked one of the most momentous and enduring conundrums of physics: if particles with opposite electric charges annihilate one another when they meet, why is there any matter left? And if there’s no more matter than antimatter in existence, then the Universe should have annihilated itself soon after the Big Bang – yet, here we are. This brief animation breaks down this extraordinary, nearly century-long science puzzle, detailing some of the surprising explanations posited by contemporary physicists.
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A basic introduction...
The reason we have a universe is that nearly all the "antimatter" is missing.
Assuming an equal match of matter to anti-matter (a decent assumption by the way) there really should be no universe. The hypothesis is that there was some disparity (unknown) that allowed a small part of matter to exist after all other matter and anti-matter canceled out. Given science only understands about 5% of the substance of our existence (normal everyday matter) it seems we have ourselves quite a mystery.
I do not expect to ever read the breakthrough answer but I strongly suspect it will be known to our progeny.