When the space shuttle Endeavour makes its final visit to the International Space Station this spring, it will leave behind a 7.8-ton parting gift: an automated particle detector called the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS), which will attach to the station. Each second, the AMS will encounter 25,000 cosmic rays—high-speed atomic and subatomic particles (some from the sun, some from deep space), the most energetic of which pack hundreds of times as much energy as anything a scientist can whip up in an Earth-based particle accelerator. The 650 computers in the instrument will track the particles’ trajectory, speed, and energy, which the device’s designers hope will provide insights into mysterious forms of matter, including antimatter, dark matter, and a hypothetical family of particles called strangelets...
Image: MIT
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