---
title: "Scientists Confirm an Incredibly Powerful Antimatter Particle Crashed Into Antarctica"
description: "Antarctica was hit with powerful antimatter particles in 2016. Find out why this triggered a subatomic phenomenon never seen before."
date: "2021-03-12"
modified: "2021-03-17"
authors:
  - name: "Dan Robitzski"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/danrobitzski.md"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/incredibly-powerful-antimatter-particle-crashed-antarctica"
categories:
  - "Physics"
  - "Science & Energy"
tags:
  - "Antimatter"
  - "icecube neutrino observatory"
  - "particle physics"
  - "the digest"
---

# Scientists Confirm an Incredibly Powerful Antimatter Particle Crashed Into Antarctica

![Scientists confirmed that a powerful antineutrino crashed into Antarctica in 2016, triggering a subatomic phenomenon that had never been verified before.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/incredibly-powerful-antimatter-particle-crashed-antarctica.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: IceCube Neutrino Observatory\</em\>*

## Crash Course

Scientists have now confirmed that an unusually powerful particle of antimatter crashed down into Antarctica back in December 2016.

The collision seems to have triggered a subatomic cascade effect called Glashow resonance, *[Live Science ](<https://www.livescience.com/extreme-neutrino-hits-antarctica.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Livesciencecom+%28LiveScience.com+Science+Headline+Feed%29>)*[reports](<https://www.livescience.com/extreme-neutrino-hits-antarctica.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Livesciencecom+%28LiveScience.com+Science+Headline+Feed%29>), which is a theoretical phenomenon that requires more energy to set off than even the most powerful particle accelerators can provide. Scientists didn't expect to see tangible evidence of Glashow resonance, but now that they have it helps further confirm the Standard Model of subatomic physics.

## Slow and Steady

It took over four years for researchers affiliated with the [IceCube Neutrino Observatory](<https://futurism.com/beyond-physics-new-research-is-revealing-the-fundamental-nature-of-subatomic-particles.md>) in Antarctica to confirm the Glashow resonance, according to [the study](<https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03256-1.epdf?sharing_token=bmXAPsLue73aJf8igjyFydRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0O2FN1FHPNt7t7bqNjEUrNSKAMAtyEudikAq5bebS1qgPIpszzTwWsPBFVqzh0qnqyMq_QrCNmX84llEFs8F_jP9A1mEE49jPDo5h467RaO1dpB0P5xwnGaS9m2zD79HgMuE4Y4DMeTZSXC_aDc7uUV0_MrTJFCnAotQIfMA2kcrHyo0mWzftI9BfdQUihrpdH5QKRNXqtYXp75ukp1pTZvfwrRq93N5rMAMTdivnRg0rI12rsrB-ua1cqXYNAOfF-ab_5T41adW9vzhah2rxr1BYnHN5cgidpVseafszVcDMPk3tLn8dBXYeM0TM99Uz7GDer_5Vxiio63HNYRXGNLuJqbOyzKt1rGJ3BGZ1WcC9xJjwCNnNQUH0RWWqUV0SxCLAhjQd8C_Ct570yEnYxD&tracking_referrer=www.livescience.com>), published Wednesday in the journal *Nature*.

But that's nothing compared to how long scientists have been waiting to spot the bizarre phenomenon. *Live Science* notes that Stephen Glashow first came up with the notion of the subatomic cascade back in 1960 and that it's been a matter of pure theory that whole time.

## Flash Physics

The actual cascade of Glashow resonance involves an antineutrino — or even a regular neutrino — crashing into an electron with so much energy that it produces a comparatively-large particle called a W boson.

Doing this requires the extremely-tiny antineutrino to carry 6.3 petaelectronvolts, or the amount of energy of 6.3 quadrillion electrons accelerated by a single volt. That's the same, *Live Science* calculated, as 6,300 mosquitos traveling at one mile per hour — or one mosquito traveling 8.2 times the speed of sound.

That's 450 times the energy that the Large Hadron Collider is expected to produce *after* it's done being upgrade, *Live Science* reports, meaning scientists are left waiting for these bizarre, rare phenomena to happen on their own in nature.

**READ MORE:** [Monster antimatter particle slams into Antarctica](<https://www.livescience.com/extreme-neutrino-hits-antarctica.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Livesciencecom+%28LiveScience.com+Science+Headline+Feed%29>) \[*Live Science*\]

**More on the IceCube Neutrino Observatory:** *[Beyond Physics: New Research is Revealing the Fundamental Nature of Subatomic Particles](<https://futurism.com/beyond-physics-new-research-is-revealing-the-fundamental-nature-of-subatomic-particles.md>)*

## Author
Dan Robitzki is a senior reporter for Futurism, where he likes to cover AI, tech ethics, and medicine. He spends his extra time fencing and streaming games from Los Angeles, California.

### Author social links  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/danrobitzski>)

## More

- [For the First Time, Scientists Have Measured the Earth’s Ability to Absorb Neutrinos](<https://futurism.com/first-time-scientists-measured-earths-ability-absorb-neutrinos.md>)
- [Beyond Physics: New Research is Revealing the Fundamental Nature of Subatomic Particles](<https://futurism.com/beyond-physics-new-research-is-revealing-the-fundamental-nature-of-subatomic-particles.md>)
- [Scientists Discover Bizarre Signals Coming From Ice in Antarctica](<https://futurism.com/bizarre-ice-signals-antarctica.md>)
- [Something Wild Just Happened at the CERN Particle Accelerator](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/cern-particle-accelerator-kaon.md>)
- [This Madlad Wants to Build a Particle Collider on the Moon](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/madlad-build-particle-collider-moon.md>)
- [Physicist Begs Colleagues Not to Build Another Large Hadron Collider](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/physicist-not-another-collider.md>)
- [New Research: Antimatter Could Be Portal to “Dark Universe”](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/research-antimatter-portal-dark-universe.md>)
- [We’re Almost Able to Cool Antimatter. Here’s Why That’s a Big Deal.](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/cooling-antimatter-cern.md>)