Negative gravitational mass

Paolo Tritella1,*
1 Independent scholar, None, Roseto degli Abruzzi, 64026, Italy
* paolotritella@libero.it

ABSTRACT

Commonly the mass of positron is said to be positive, as the electron mass. But is it true? The Dirac equation is valid also for
particles of negative mass. In this article it is supposed that the positron has a negative gravitational mass, but positive inertial
mass. Possible consequences are examined and a way to see the right sign of the mass is devised.

1 Introduction

There has been recently an increasing interest in the negative mass, that can explain the pair formation by the model of
composite photon7 . But does the negative mass exists? This is the question of this article. A possible candidate is antimatter.
But this is treated commonly as having positive mass and it is said the mass is the antimatter of itself. But there are some
strange things. Why two neutral pions don’t annihilate? Why there is not the principle of conservation of the rest mass? The
following describes a method to inquire if that mass is negative.

2 Method

With negative gravitational mass and positive inertial mass, the gravitational forces between negative masses are convergent, as
for positive masses, as well as the accelerations, instead the forces between positive and negative mass are divergent and the
accelerations too.8
Fig. 1: Taken from Ian Clague with the permission of the Author.

3 Difficult to reveal
But the forces due to gravitation are so weak that they are difficult to reveal. Nothing changes with the electric force. The
positron is attracted by an electron as is attracted by an anti-proton. The gravitational force is repulsive with the electron and
attractive with the anti-proton, but his contribution doesn’t produce relevant effects to be observed. So the revelation is critical,
very difficult.

Fig. 2: The electric force between positron and electron.

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4 How to reveal
But a way to reveal it there is. The phase of a neutron’s beam varies with gravity.
It is the phenomenon of gravitationally induced quantum interference. A neutrons interferometer is used to observe the
quantum-mechanical phase shift of neutrons caused by their interaction with Earth’s gravitational field.11
A neutrons beam is split at A into two beams by the interferometer. The relative phase of the two beams where they
recombine and interfere, at point D of Fig. 1 is varied by rotating the interferometer about the line AC of the incident beam.12

Fig. 3: Neutrons count as the phase induced by gravity varies. Taken from Sakuray.

The expression for the phase shift is12, 13

min mgrav gl1 l2 λ
βgrav =M Φgrav = ΦABD − ΦACD = − sin φ = qgrav sin φ − π2 < φ < π
2
h̄2
min the absolute value of the neutron (anti-neutron) inertial mass,
mgrav the absolute value of the neutron (anti-neutron) gravitational mass,
l1 , l2 the dimensions of the rectangle ABDC,
λ the wavelength of the neutron beam,
φ the angle of the inclination of the rectangle with respect to the horizontal plane (see fig. 6).

Fig. 4: Neutrons count as the phase induced by gravity varies. Taken from Sakuray.

If we use anti-neutrons, the negative gravitational mass has the sign changed

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 min mgrav gl1 l2 λ
βgrav =M Φgrav = ΦABD − ΦACD = sin φ
h̄2
The phase shift βgrav changes sign, but the result of the neutrons counting is proportional12 to cos(βgrav )

so there are no changes in the interference pattern.

Fig. 5: Anti-neutrons count as the phase induced by gravity varies. Taken from Sakuray.

But there is the bending (due to the interferometer weight), proportional to the angle of rotation of the apparatus,

βbend = qbend sin φ

The value of qbend can be obtained by using x rays.

The total phase shift is

β = (qgrav + qbend ) sin ϕ

From the value of

qgrav + qbend

obtained experimentally, it is possible to have the correct sign of the gravitational mass of the anti-neutron12 .

In β this time changes not only the sign, but also the module, so the interference pattern is modified.

Colella et al.12 found a value

qgrav + qbend = 54.3

and

qgrav = 59.6

Knowing qbend it is possible to know the new value of qgrav and then check the sign of the anti-neutron mass.

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Fig. 6: Schematic diagram of the neutron interferometer. Taken from Colella et al.

5 Results
We see that with the procedure described it is possible to establish if a negative mass exists. If so, important consequences may
be in many fields of science. If particle and antiparticle annihilate, the masses cannot be the same. Otherwise also two identical
particles, e.g. two neutral pion’s, must annihilate. There must be something in the positron mass that is different and marks it to
be an antiparticle. If so, we have a new principle of conservation in nature, that of the rest mass, that it is strange not to be.

6 Conclusions
In this article we describe a way to stress the existence of negative mass. If proved, we have one more symmetry in nature and
the possibility of unthinkable applications.

Additional information
There are no competing interests.

Acknowledgement
Thanks to Cristina, Grazia, Carina, Bruno, Natale, Orazio, Pietro, Mary, Internet.
Thanks to Ian Clague for his important critic.

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