You want fun future weapons? Look up Mirror Matter, the stuff may exist, if it does mirror bombs might be able to pentrate right through solid matter.

It doesn't work if the 'target' is over 25. It still works if the 'user' of such pick-up lines is under 35.

Word!

Dr. Noonian Soong unavailable for comment.

OK, so here is the only problem... (Warning some physics geekitude ahead...possible minor math...)

A positron has the same mass as an electron. Now, how often to you here about a pound of electrons...you don't, because their really too small to be useful*. The real reason to create positrons is so that they can be paired with anti-protons to make anti-hydrogen. Now you can have a pound of hydrogen, so you could have a pound of anti-hydrogen. Unfortunately, anti-hydrogen is not effected by magentic fields (it is electrically neutral...) so storing it, without letting it touch any real matter, is very very very very difficult. So maybe you keep the anti-hydrogen very cold, like 3degrees kelvin and maybe it has some superconductity properties there and you could get it to magnetically levitate. So you got a anti-hydrogen bomb. Now you got to store it, on ships, in planes, being handled by high school graduates...and it has to be kept cold, and relativly still...

Yes, I think we have a long way to go to anti-matter weapons...

* Use E=mc^2, look up the mass of an electron, multiply times 2 (one is the electron, one is the positron) multiply by the speed of light (3x10^8 m/s) and that will give you a number that is kg*m/s which is also known as a Joule. Joules per second is a Watt... now figure out how much mass of electrons and positrons it would take to run a 100W light bulb... Then try the whole thing over using the mass of a proton times two in E=mc^2...

Mmmmmmmmm..... anti-hydrogen

PICTURES, DAMMIT! I'm a guy! I need visual stimulation, even when we're talking about Warpron. None of this female-orineted verbal warotica Tom-Clancy-meets-Harlequin BS! Show me pictures of stuff being vaporized!

Right now, usable quantities of antimatter are as "out there" as a usable anti-gravity system. But the power/mass ratio is awesome. All mass is converted into energy in a matter-anti matter interaction. Less than a gram of matter was actually converted into energy in the Hiroshima bomb. A 10 megaton bomb converts less than a pound of it's matter into energy. But "if" it could be produced in an enormously energy intensive process, AND safely stored in anything bigger than nanonanonano gram quantities, well, yeah it would be something.

Another so far sci-fi concept is the isotopic bomb. Physicists have noted for decades that some rare radioisotopes can be made to decay far faster than their random decay half life number - with the application of electrical stimuli. A particular hafnium isotope most promising.

The Russians were interested in it. But the technological hurtles are staggering. The quantum mechanics math of understanding the process of stimuli of an isotope into decay, the loss of reactor effeciency to make it, the difficulty in separating out one of 8 or so metastable isotopes of hafnium that has this characteristic are beyond us. But theoretically, you could make 1-2 ounces of that special hafnium isotope release the energy of 10-30 tons of TNT if we knew how to do it, with far less radioactive contamination -. But a still a firecracker compared to a real nuke.

There is also the matter of economics. If you have an enemy that you absolutely have to take out because they have already used a nuke or potent biowar strike against us, our thermonuclear arsenal is relatively cheap to create and maintain as a deterrent. A 500KT weapon makes a heck of a bunker buster - and in extremis...you probably wouldn't give two hoots about innocent little Islami babies and cuddly little goats being blasted and irradiated in the process of ensuring that group or country never uses a WMD again.

Why would the energy of annhiliation have anything to do with anti-gravity?

"Why would the energy of annhiliation have anything to do with anti-gravity?"

Beats me, I'm still enjoying my cigarette...

ACE - just an analogy. Usable quantities of anti-matter are as remote from reality as a useable anti-gravity system, based on current scientific knowledge, existing technology, and practical energy limitations.

The current process of creating anti-matter involves vast amounts of energy to get a few atoms produced.

Sort of like the old trap some people fall in that note that water is hydrogen and oxygen, therefore a source of perpetual energy. Missing the obvious that far more useful energy must be used to get water to separate into it's constituent elements than can be created from using that hydrogen for energy uses.

We don't need any more weapons with mass killing capability. We need portable weapons with tight patterns.

I am of the belief that Tesla was behind that Siberian thing. I believe we are still using his inventions to blow stuff up only in secret.

For those who can't wait a few centuries for anti-matter weapons, have a look at the Airborne Laser, prototype already being tested.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/abl.htm

I am of the belief that Tesla was behind that Siberian thing.

I heard that the Kerry campaign has Tesla in cryogenic stasis, and that he will be reanimated to serve as the Secretary of Energy.

Zombie Hippocrates is keeping Tesla in the state physiological suspension for Kerry. Zombie Hippocrates will be Secretary of Wellness under Kerry.

(In the words of Miss Piggy),
Why would they put Kelvin Lynn in an "antimatter trap"? I think your mental masturbation has progressed beyond worldly use. Why oh why would anyone put such a nice man in such a terrible trap?
You've choked my chikken once too often sonny boy. Now, Kerry is a negatronic and Bush is a positronic. If you put these nice young men in that trap thingy what happens to them? Isn't this part of the vast right wing conspiracy? Well, speak up! Is it?

Cedarford is the resident expert on everything. Just ask him.