(Unofficial) A Primer on Anti-Mass Spectrometry

Nick

The Anti-Mass What now?

The Anti-Mass Spectrometer is a central part of the Half-Life storyline and a large component of the BMRP experience. Still, when asked to describe what it is the device and the facility around it really do, many fall silent, and rightfully so since the concept of mass spectrometry isn't the kind of thing you learn during the course of the average person's studies.

In this thread, I'll try to shed some light on this generally pretty obscure topic, and in doing so hopefully give you, my fellow players, the tools to better roleplay working with it. Obviously; I am no chemist nor physicist, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. I'll leave some sources and further reading material at the end, but I don't expect you to sift through any of it.

Before we start I'd also like to say that I do not represent the server or its stance on the lore regarding the Anti-Mass Spectrometer or its uses. If there are contradictions between this document and the server's own lore, the server lore takes precedence by default, in a server like this everything can't and doesn't have to make perfect sense, some things have to be amended for the sake of making the server fun to play on.

What it isn't:
Before we start defining what anti-mass spectrometry and the anti-mass spectrometer is, we'll go through what it definitely is not:

A teleporter.
The AMS is not a teleporter by design, it's an instrument for measurement.
A laser/weapon.
The AMS was not built to be weaponized, nor is it an effective or portable weapon.
An unstable piece of shit.
The AMS, contrary to popular belief, is hardly as unstable as it might be represented to be. A "Resonance Cascade" in particular is highly unlikely and is considered by many to be simply impossible.

These are just some of the misconceptions about what the AMS is and/or isn't. Let's get to the real subject at hand.

A Quick Look at Mass Spectrometry

In simple English: Mass Spectrometry (MS) is a way to find the "mass-to-charge" ratio of ions and thereby to create a "mass spectrum", which is a chart plotting the intensity of this mass-to-charge ratio at different points.

Basically, through mass spectrometry, you can discover the mass of particles, which is immensely useful when you're trying to find the composition of an element or compound as you can work out the number of electrons in and from there find the corresponding atomic number.

In short; mass spectrometry is a step in the process of identifying the structures and compositions of unknown compounds and elements.

Knowing the composition of compounds is critical for the next steps; synthesis and study.

An example of a mass spectrum:
alt text

What's up with "Anti"?
So, the concept of mass spectrometry should be a little clearer by now, but what's up with the prefix "Anti" in Anti-Mass Spectrometry.

Well; mass spectrometry works fine for things with positive mass, regular matter. It does not, however, work on matter with negative mass, that being exotic matter or antimatter.

Anti-Matter Spectrometry does not, as of now, exist in the real world, however, in the Half-Life timeline, it would have been discovered.

To summarize; the Anti-Mass Spectrometer studies the composition and structure of exotic matter, as for if the Anit-Mass Spectrometer can also fill the role of a regular spectrometer is not certain, but for the purposes of the server it probably should.

So what now?

After discovering the chemical composition and structure of a compound, scientists can then start work on synthesizing sed compounds to produce them in a controlled environment. By knowing the composition and structure of the compound chemists have a blueprint to work off of.

Knowing the composition and structure of compounds can also give insights and clues regarding their properties, which is important for forming an informed hypothesis.

The End

Further reading:

Wikipedia:
Mass spectrometry (Simplified)
Mass-to-charge ratio (Simplified)

I'll add more later.

Changes:

12/DEC/2021 - Posted