How to Tell Matter From Antimatter | CP Violation & The Ozma Problem

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This video is about the Ozma problem of distinguishing the chirality (ie left-handedness or right-handedness) of matter using weak interaction processes like beta decay (for example in uranium), or neutral kaon/k-meson decay. This is wrapped up in the phenomenon of CP violation, by which charge and parity are both violated by certain weak interaction processes - this enables antimatter to be unambiguously distinguished from matter, and left handed chirality from right handed.

REFERENCES

The Ozma Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Project


Sean Carroll on CP Symmetry (& why we shouldn’t trot out baryogenesis all the time)


Electroweak CP Violation on Scholarpedia


The Wu Experiment


Martin Gardner, The New Ambidextrous Universe


Lecture notes on CP Violation and the CKM Matrix, Cambridge (Mark Thomson)


Homochirality


L-glucose (vs D-glucose)


Radioactive Nucleus Decay


CP Violation in Semi-Leptonic Decays (SEE PAGE 426 for reference to definition of MATTER)


Kaon Decay Modes


Flipped bowling Jesus scene in Big Lebowski


Isotopes of Uranium


Beta Decay


The Wu Experiment


Kaons


CP Violation in Symmetry Magazine


Physics Stack Exchange on CP Violation


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