Can we strip atoms down into their basic building blocks?

This is just a question i guess...

Is there a way to strip atoms down into their basic building blocks and hold them together separately?

I know we store electrons in batteries... So shouldn't we be able to strip atoms of their other building blocks such as Nucleolus, electrons, protons, neutrons etc?

Once we can do that shouldn't we be able to put them back together how we want to make any atom we want whether it be gold, platinum, carbon, oxygen and any other atom? that make up the periodic table?

What is stopping this from happening?

If you can think it, it can eventually be done, with realism of course.

This is what CERN does, smashing individual atoms against each other to see what's inside, etc. This is what chemists do, and molecular engineers, etc.

Although some of the methods are still very crude, and it's definitely not a perfected craft

reply to post by dominicus


Surely speeding two atoms together up near the speed of light and smashing them apart wouldn't be the only way to strip them of their core ingredients. Couldn't there be an easier way?

reply to post by DaRAGE

Once we can do that shouldn't we be able to put them back together how we want to make any atom we want whether it be gold, platinum, carbon, oxygen and any other atom? that make up the periodic table?

There's a lab that make gold out of mercury, but the amount of energy needed for the process exceeds cost effectivity.
Source

Mercury 196, an isotope that can pick up a neutron, is placed in a nuclear reactor, and after 23 hours, it turns to gold. A real life Philosopher’s Stone at our university! However, a days’ worth of nuclear reactions will create 3/10 of a cent worth of gold but costs $200 per hour to operate the reactor. You’ll be far in the hole.

The problem is the strong nuclear force, which is about 100 times stronger than the electro magnetic force.

So pulling protons or neutrons out of a atoms nucleus is much harder than pulling electrons off the atom.

And once you have ripped the nucleus apart the protons and neutrons have a lot of energy (because thats how you managed to get them out), so you can't really store them in that state.

Cern does smash atoms together, but mostly they smash individual protrons together.

OH alright then so very energy intensive and therefore expensive. ;-(

Thanks guys

Originally posted by DaRAGE
OH alright then so very energy intensive and therefore expensive. ;-(

Thanks guys

Pretty much this.

Until we can find methods separating and recombining atoms on a mass scale with little energy used, alchemy is still far off.

when we figure that out, we will truly be masters of our environment.

reply to post by DaRAGE


That seems like a chain reaction many wouldn't want to experience. In this matter based zone w/o HIGHER intelligence w/ experience assisting or guiding the tech...

Interesting concept. Its just the atom isn't fully understood here the spaces between the particles electrons-neutron-proton may be governed by un known factors and so how do those who deconstruct put back together the particles with the proper spaces between them?

reply to post by Biigs

when we figure that out, we will truly be masters of our environment.

in due time it will be figured out. Think energy amplifiers. They'll eventually be able to crack the codes on how to manipulate the bods in a very easy and precise manner using a combo of electro-magntism combined with plasma tech and lasers.

It's already being discussed in theoretical physics and among futurists on how to go about it.

IF you believe in UFO's/Anti-Grav, then it's precisely the tech necessary to get some exotic rare isotopes that would then create their own gravitational force

It's not impossible to separate the different components of an atom. As others have said, the required energy would be costly.

But think about our two major bombs, the fusion and fission. With fusion, we compact and compress atoms together, and the fission we separate the atoms. Either way, there's a big boom, with other unwanted side effects!

Really, what I'd suggest is that if we had a large enough energy source, we could then probably sequence them, just as they now do with DNA, to make any element we want.

We're a long way from that (I think), but it's what the Enterprise used in their food replicators for instance!

reply to post by DaRAGE

I know we store electrons in batteries...

Batteries don't store electrons in the context you seem to be using here -- as discrete from the body of an atom. Batteries move electrons across chemical species in a reduction-oxidation reaction.

So shouldn't we be able to strip atoms of their other building blocks such as Nucleolus, electrons, protons, neutrons etc?

We can.

Once we can do that shouldn't we be able to put them back together how we want to make any atom we want whether it be gold, platinum, carbon, oxygen and any other atom? that make up the periodic table?

In theory, we can using combinations of various decay and nucleosynthesis mechanisms.

What is stopping this from happening?

Based on our technology right now, it's not worth it from an economic standpoint. The amount of time, energy, resources, etc. that we'd have to expend to do so is much higher than the value of the elements we'd be forming. Electrons are easy to move, protons are not.

The fact DNA has codes not unlike a base Operating system for life could be the clue to a similar base code for matter sitting under it. A bit like you would have a Windows 3.11 Operating system running fancy graphics and sounds sitting on a base operating system like DOS. Both are operating systems with one running subservient to the other.

I personally think the Hadron is all about finding the base code for matter and once this is found manifestation of elements from nothing becomes possible. I'm gambling the base code is deviously hidden from the subservient Operating System we exist on with complex encryption and even possibly self terminating code. To find it we would need to be very lucky or....

Originally posted by DaRAGE
reply to post by dominicus

 

Surely speeding two atoms together up near the speed of light and smashing them apart wouldn't be the only way to strip them of their core ingredients. Couldn't there be an easier way?

The energy required to separate the Hadrons (protons and neutrons) from an atom are created only by smashing them together at high speeds.

That's the only way of creating the required energy right now. That's what they do at CERN and at the LHC and at the RHIC in New York, Fermilab in Illinois, the SLAC in California, and at other particle accelerators around the world.

Not only are the separating hadrons from the atoms, but they are also separating out the things from the hadrons that make up the hadrons (i.e., quarks).

In all actuality, we can cost effectivly make elements from other elements.

The requirements are as such:

160,000 volts @
Source material, usually mercury or seawater, the higher in minerals the better.
Alot of time.


To be cost effect you would need a solar farm that could generate about 1 terrawatt/hr, that's pretty difficult, but if you had it you could eventually recoup the cost of materials at current market value in about 35 years.

You have to realize when we are talking about doing this, its not like you take a baseball size glop of mercury zap it in the microwave and out comes gold. The material is formed atom by atom in a slow process and its difficult to accumulate into any significant amount.

Germany is already starting a project of this sort since you can get significant gold/silver from sea water as its already in there in trace amounts the process "supposedly" converts most of the other free minerals as well.

Surely speeding two atoms together up near the speed of light and smashing them apart wouldn't be the only way to strip them of their core ingredients. Couldn't there be an easier way?

Atom smashers and nuclear reactors are not the only way to do this by any means. A more modern method uses simply electricity and plasma under extreme magnetic forces. I don't know if we would qualify that as "easier" but it is an alternate method that is practical on a small scale.

Here's the "for dummies" version of the mercury to gold process:

reply to post by DaRAGE


It's already happening in stars and supernovae, and it's called nuclear fusion. But it requires huge energy. en.wikipedia.org...

A free neutron is unstable, and will decay into a proton within 15 minutes. en.wikipedia.org...

Free protons and electrons are more common, you can find them flying around in interstellar space. But to fuse protons (Hydrogen nuclei) together to form Helium, requires pressures and temperatures commonly found only in stars.

What's more, protons and neutrons consist of quarks, and to separate quarks you'd need an unimaginable amount of energy. en.wikipedia.org...

Transmutation is possible.
So yes separating an atom to its main constituents should be possible also,
but to do it safely would be of essence