Scientists working on the BASE experiment at CERN have successfully transported a trap filled with antiprotons in a truck across the laboratory’s main site, marking the first time antimatter has been moved in this way.
BASE (Baryon Antibaryon Symmetry Experiment) is a CERN experiment conducting precise measurements of antiproton properties to compare them with protons and test fundamental physics.
CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is located near Geneva, Switzerland, and is the largest particle physics laboratory in the world.
The team accumulated a cloud of 92 antiprotons in a portable cryogenic Penning trap known as BASE-STEP. They disconnected the trap from the experimental facility, loaded it onto a truck, and resumed operations after the transport, officials said on Tuesday.
The feat is a key step toward delivering antiprotons to other European laboratories for higher-precision measurements.
Antimatter annihilates instantly on contact with ordinary matter, making it extremely difficult to preserve and transport.
Stefan Ulmer, spokesperson for the BASE collaboration, said the move was necessary because equipment in CERN’s antimatter factory creates tiny magnetic field fluctuations that limit the precision of measurements.
“The machines and equipment in CERN’s ‘antimatter factory’, where BASE is located, generate magnetic field fluctuations that limit how far we can push our precision measurements,” Ulmer said. “However, the precision of the measurements taken in BASE is such that gaining an even deeper understanding of the fundamental properties of antiprotons will require moving the experiment out of the building.”
The BASE-STEP trap weighs about 1,000 kilograms (about 2,204.62 pounds) and is compact enough to fit on a truck and through ordinary laboratory doors. It includes a superconducting magnet, liquid-helium cryogenic cooling, power reserves, and a vacuum chamber that contains the antiprotons and is surrounded by magnetic and electric fields. The system is designed to absorb road vibrations up to 1 G-force.
Christian Smorra, leader of the BASE-STEP project, said the goal is to share antiprotons with precision labs elsewhere.
“Our aim with BASE-STEP is to be able to trap antiprotons and deliver them to our precision laboratories at a dedicated space at CERN, HHU, Leibnitz University Hannover, and perhaps other laboratories that are capable of performing very-high-precision antiproton measurements, which unfortunately is not possible in the antimatter factory,” Smorra said. “We validated the feasibility of the project with protons last year, but what we achieved today with antiprotons is a huge leap forward towards our objective.”
The first planned destination is a dedicated lab at Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf, Germany. The trip would take at least eight hours, requiring the superconducting magnet to stay below 8.2 Kelvin. Researchers are exploring the use of a generator-powered cryocooler on the truck.
CERN Director for Research and Computing Gautier Hamel de Monchenault congratulated the team.
“Transporting antimatter is a pioneering and ambitious project, and I congratulate the BASE collaboration on this impressive milestone. We are at the beginning of an exciting scientific journey that will allow us to further deepen our understanding of antimatter,” he said.
CERN’s antimatter factory is the world’s only source of low-energy antiprotons, produced by the Antiproton Decelerator and the Extra Low Energy Antiproton ring. The BASE collaboration has held records for storing antiprotons for more than a year and developed the transportable trap to advance its studies of antimatter properties, such as the magnetic moment of antiprotons, which could help explain why the universe contains far more matter than antimatter.
