"Cosmic Seesaw": New Theory Balances Universe's Visible Matter with Antimatter

[n2doc]

Physicists have proposed a unified explanation for dark matter and the so-called baryon asymmetry--the apparent imbalance of matter with positive baryon charge and antimatter with negative baryon charge in the Universe. UBC and TRIUMF physicists have proposed a unified explanation for dark matter and the so-called baryon asymmetry--the apparent imbalance of matter with positive baryon charge and antimatter with negative baryon charge in the Universe. Observations of the the big bang’s afterglow, the cosmic microwave background, by the WMAP satellite now show about 4.6 per cent of the Universe (by density) is comprised of atoms, with about five times more dark matter (23 per cent).

The visible Universe appears to be made of atoms, and each of these atoms carries a positive baryon charge equal to total number of protons and neutrons in its nucleus.

However, since the discovery of antimatter in 1932, researchers have wondered why the Universe doesn't hold a neutral baryon charge--requiring as much negatively charged antimatter as positively charged matter.

“We’ve proposed a matter formation scenario where the positive baryon number of visible atoms is in balance with the equal and opposite negative baryon number of dark matter,” says Kris Sigurdson, an assistant professor of Physics and Astronomy at UBC, who worked with colleagues at TRIUMF, Canada’s National Laboratory for Particle Physics, and researchers at Brookhaven National Laboratory in the US, on the theory. "This links the formation of atoms and dark matter and helps resolve the baryon asymmetry mystery, as the total dark plus visible baryon balance of the Universe is restored."

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http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/11/new-theory-balances-visible-matter-of-the-universe-with-antimatter.html