Wednesday,
June 14,
Italians Lauch
"Pamela" to Study "DarkSide" of
Space
The
ANNOTICO Report
The
"Dark Side" is Dark Matter, and
Dark Energy, accounting for 95% of the Universe, while Matter 5%, and
Anti Matter exist only in minute amounts.!!!
"Pamela"
(Payload for Anti-matter Matter Exploration and Light-nuclei Astrophysics) is a
satellite, described as a "parallelepipedon 4
feet tall", weighs in at nearly 500kg, and
will spend three years in a quasi-polar elliptic orbit about 500 kilometres above the earth.
The
Italian Space Agency (ASI) says Pamela" is essentially a large magnet with
a variety of detectors attached, capable of identifying the particles in the
cosmic rays, their trajectories and their energies, all of which help to
understand their origins, and is "the most
advanced instrument for this field of astrophysics".
While
hoping to shed light on Dark Matter and Dark Energy, Matter and Anti Matter need
explanation also.
Matter
and anti-matter are thought to have existed in roughly equal quantities at the
time of the Big Bang. Since the two types of matter annihilate each other on
contact, this poses a problem: why is there so much more normal matter hanging
around in the form of planets and stars? What is the difference between the two
kinds of matter?
Pamela may solve some of
these mysteries.
The
Register
By Lucy Sherriff
Wednesday
14th June 2006
Tomorrow will see
the launch of Pamela, a satellite designed to seek out evidence of dark matter
and anti-matter in cosmic rays.
Pamela (Payload
for Anti-matter Matter Exploration and Light-nuclei Astrophysics) is a joint
project between the Italian and Russian space agencies, with contributions from
their equivalents in
The satellite,
described as a "parallelepipedon 1.3 metres tall", will spend three years in a quasi-polar
elliptic orbit between 300 and 600 kilometres from
the ground. The Italian Space Agency (ASI) says the satellite will measure
flux, energy, and characteristics of galactic, interplanetary, and solar cosmic
rays at a new level of precision.
The main
instrument, which weighs in at nearly 500kg, is essentially a large magnet with
a variety of detectors attached, capable of identifying the particles in the
cosmic rays, their trajectories and their energies, all of which help to
understand their origins.
Piegiorgio Picozza,
director of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) section of
Tor Vergata, described the satellite as "the
most advanced instrument for this field of astrophysics".
Matter than we
can see accounts for just five per cent of the universe. The remaining 95 per
cent is theorised to be composed of around 25 per
cent dark matter and 70 per cent dark energy.
Anti-matter,
meanwhile, exists only in tiny quantities, although matter and anti-matter are
thought to have existed in roughly equal quantities at the time of the Big
Bang.
Since the two
types of matter anihilate each other on contact, this
poses a problem: why is there so much more normal matter hanging around in the
form of planets and stars? What is the difference between the two kinds of
matter? Researchers at ASI and the Russian Space Agency hope that Pamela will
shed some light on these mysteries.
The launch is
slated for June 15.
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