On this channel many times we have pondered over the question of what exactly
is a black hole beyond the event horizon what would we find in a black hole's core
that makes it powerful enough to break time reality and laws of physics all at once
but have you ever wondered there could be something lurking in the core of a neutron
star that is more dangerous and mysterious welcome the Factnomenal and today let's find
out perhaps the biggest mystery of the universe what is strange matter
neutron stars are the most dangerous and densest cosmic objects in the universe that are in black
holes at the end of the life of a supermassive star gravity suddenly and catastrophically gets
the upper hand in the war it has been waging with the star's internal pressure for billions of years
with its nuclear fuel exhausted and the outward pressure removed gravity suddenly compresses the
star inward a shock wave travels to the core and rebounds blowing the star apart this whole process
takes perhaps a couple of seconds and is what we call a supernova explosion with most of the star
blown into space the core remains but gravity isn't done yet it will keep on raging against
the core to have it collapse on itself and turn it into a black hole however neutron stars are the
star cores that manage to survive this bout with gravity if the core of the former star is strong
enough it will put up a fight against gravity but it will pay the price for such resistance
the gravity will compress the core to the point that atoms inside the core will push against each
other and the cramming will cause the electrons to thrust violently into their parent nuclei
this will force them to combine with protons and form neutrons and that's how the neutron
star gets its name so obviously the fact alone that neutron stars are the ultimate survivors
should make you wonder what exactly is fueling these star's resilience well the answer may be the
doom of the entire universe a thing we call for the lack of a better term strange matter strange
matter could be the most dangerous substance in the entire universe just like the singularity of
a black hole strange matter has no care for the laws of physics and the universe itself
if strange matter is unleashed on the universe it could possibly become the contagion that
would wipe out the entire universe no we're not kidding but if the strange matter doesn't turn
out to be the epitome of what's the worst that could happen then studying it may unlock the
secrets of the question we have been asking for quite a few centuries now how did the universe
begin and what caused the big bang to understand strange matter we need to have basic knowledge of
how neutron stars are made but that is a very large subject to dabble into one single video
so let's just give you all a little bit more details while keeping it conveniently simple
we already explained that neutron stars are made of the surviving core of a supermassive star
exploding into a supernova as the arm-wrestling match between gravity and the core commences
the inward force of gravity squeezes nuclei and particles together violently forcing electrons and
protons to merge and form neutrons here's where things get weird atoms usually have a lot of empty
space to let everything inside breathe but in the case of a neutron star all the space inside
of its atoms are filled with all these particles the force between these particles causes them to
repel from each other but frankly there is nowhere to go atoms at this moment are as congested as a
local train in Mumbai so the particles have no choice but to stick together therefore with all
this energy building inside atoms of the former supermassive star's core they push outwards if
they manage to match the inward force of gravity the core becomes a neutron star as its density
flies through the roof this is why neutron stars are very small but also they are extremely dense
a teaspoon of neutron star material would weigh more than a billion us tons that's more than the
mass of Mount Everest one teaspoon of neutron star material would weigh as much as 700 great pyramids
of Giza a neutron is only about 10 to 15 miles in circumference hardly as big as an American
city but would be heavier than a sun-sized star this density exerts so much pressure
inside the environment of the neutron star's core that the rules of nuclear physics begin
to jumble up inside and the chorus composition turns almost entirely into the strange matter
but how does that happen well because of quarks an atom's nucleus is made up of protons and neutrons
and these two are made up of the same smaller particles called quarks
quarks are extremely monophobic they do not like to be isolated and that is why
they are called confine if we were to try to break them apart they would try
even harder to stay together but if you did manage to use enough energy to split them
they will use that very energy to create more quarks to keep them company quarks come in
many types but only two of them appear to make stable matter the up and the down quarks two
up quarks and one down quark make a proton and two down quarks and one up quark make a neutron
the other types of quarks decay quickly but in a neutron star things could be very different
the forces operating inside neutron stars could be infinitesimally extreme and similar to how
things were immediately after the big bang so if we managed to get a peek inside the core of a
neutron star it would be like looking at a perfect copy of a fossil of the very first dinosaur only
in this case we would be looking at the replica of a small sample of the primordial universe
this is why scientists are so eager to learn how quarks behave inside a neutron star
to be able to discern the very nature of the universe itself some theoretical physicists
believe that inside a neutron star core protons and neutrons may deconfine as the particles are
crammed next to each other with no space to repel this extreme congestion may cause the
particles to dissolve into a pool of quarks these particles or quarks may reassemble into
one giant substance made purely of quarks instead of atoms this quark matter may turn some neutron
stars into quark stars and this is where things become dangerous when pressure builds up inside
a quark star like a boiler it may force quarks to act differently some quarks may alter their
nature and become stronger quarks these stranger things have bizarre nuclear properties and are
stronger and heavier than your regular quark strange quarks then may create strange matter
strange matter would be the most desirable form of matter that every matter ever wanted to be
perfectly dense indestructible and more stable than any other matter that exists in our universe
such stability would allow this matter to exist with or without the neutron stars
so if the strange matter does exist outside neutron stars this could be the doomsday device
for the entire universe its stability could be infectious and every matter that strange matter
would come in contact with would have its protons and neutrons dissolved and join the quark bath
turning that substance into strange matter as well like a pandemic the infection of strange
matter will spread across the universe but do we need to worry if such strange matter is locked
inside neutron stars well no but yes because often neutron stars collide with others of their own
kind or with black holes such a collision causes a massive spill of substances and energy from within
these highly volatile cosmic objects and droplets of strange matter strangelets if you will could
then escape these strangelets would be no less dense than the core of a neutron star but they
would be tiny even subatomic carried by the sheer energy released by the neutron star collision
they would travel great lengths to ultimately make contact with a star like our sun or a planet like
our earth even a subatomic strange lit would be enough to begin converting our energy into strange
matter along with everything and every living being on it the more it converts the more it
would grow until the whole earth becomes a strange planet but as strange matter is extraordinarily
dense the earth would begin to shrink reducing it to a hot clump the size of an asteroid
all because of a subatomic drop of strange matter that nobody could ever see coming before you begin
to have an existential crisis about a strangelet with the earth's name written on it that could
strike us at any given moment you may want to hear another theory contrary to the one
we just mentioned many scientists believe that strangelets are more common than we could assume
their number could be enough to outnumber all the stars in the galaxy
the advocates of these theories suggest that these free-roaming strangelets must be primordial
forming when the universe was dense and hot like a neutron star's insides
they could have been clumping around the gravity of galaxies and spreading everywhere
as the universe expanded and evolved this theory proposes that these strangelets are the same thing
that we call dark matter and possibly the bonding agent that holds galaxies together however all
these theories are pretty much speculation the earth the sun and our galaxy have survived eons
so the odds of a universal pandemic taking us out are next to nothing but what do you think are
strange let's the universe-wide accidents waiting to happen or are they the shrouded protector of
our galaxy also known as dark matter tell us in the comments and thanks for watching Factnomenal