Scientists figure out subatomic particles can fuse together, consider withholding findings

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A pair of physicists announced the discovery of a subatomic event so powerful that the researchers wondered if it was too dangerous to make public.

The explosive event? The duo showed that two tiny particles known as bottom quarks could theoretically fuse together in a powerful flash. The result: a larger subatomic particle, a second, spare particle known as a nucleon, and a whole mess of energy spilling out into the universe. This "quarksplosion" would be an even more powerful subatomic analog of the individual nuclear fusion reactions that take place in the cores of hydrogen bombs.

Quarks are tiny particles that are usually found clinging together to make up the neutrons and protons inside atoms. They come in six versions or "flavors": up, down, top, bottom, strange and charm.

Energetic events at the subatomic level are measured in megaelectronvolts (MeV), and when two bottom quarks fuse, the physicists found, they produce a whopping 138 MeV. That's about eight times more powerful than one of the individual nuclear fusion events that takes place in hydrogen bombs (a full-scale bomb blast consists of billions of these events). H-bombs fuse together tiny hydrogen nuclei known as deuterons and tritons to create helium nuclei, along with the most powerful explosions in the human arsenal. But each of those individual reactions inside the bombs releases only about 18 MeV, according to the Nuclear Weapon Archive, a website devoted to collecting research and data about nuclear weapons. That’s far less than the fusing bottom quarks’ 138 MeV.

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"I must admit that when I first realized that such a reaction was possible, I was scared," co-researcher Marek Karliner of Tel Aviv University in Israel told Live Science. "But, luckily, it is a one-trick pony."

As powerful as fusion reactions are, a single instance of fusion on its own isn't at all dangerous. Hydrogen bombs derive their enormous power from chain reactions — the cascading fusion of lots and lots of nuclei all at once.

Karliner and Jonathan Rosner, of the University of Chicago, determined that such a chain reaction wouldn't be possible with bottom quarks, and, before publishing, privately shared their insight with colleagues, who agreed.

"If I thought for a microsecond that this had any military applications, I would not have published it," Karliner said.

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