What a difference a year makes...

Only a year ago I wrote about CERN, the large hadron collider coming back online after repairs.

CERN Scientists announced recently that they had had some amazing success. They figured out how to trap atoms of antimatter. Yes, I said antimatter. The stuff that, if it comes into contact with matter, is destroyed instantly in a violent burst of energy.

They caught 38 antihydrogen atoms in a magnetic trap and held them long enough to study them. When they had captured them in the past they had immediately been destroyed by touching the matter on the side of the container.

One of the scientists said "This will help us understand the structure of space and time. For reasons that no one yet understands, nature ruled out antimatter... this inspires us to work that much harder to see if antimatter holds some secret."

Look for lots more exciting discoveries from CERN!

Space-Time Invisibility Cloak

What would you do if you could conceal yourself both in space and time? Someday that may be possible to do.

Scientists at the Imperial College London have built on previous work to make this possible -- at least in theory. Scientists have already established that the use of fabrics made with "metamaterials" could bend light around an object making it appear invisible. Does that remind you of Harry Potter's invisibility cloak?

Metamaterials are artificial materials designed and minipulated at the molecular level to interact with and control electromagnetic waves, according to the story on CNN.com.

Scientists now have extended this invisibility cloak idea to time as well. The theory goes that as light enters the metamaterial, some parts speed up and some slow down, creating what they call a "blind spot" in time. Some light gets there before the event and some light after it occurs.

Do you think this would be useful for any real-life applications? No criminal uses, please!