system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Energy can be converted into matter and vice-versa. Can energy be converted into antimatter?
gpt
The terms "matter" and "antimatter" here are a bit misleading, because what we call "matter" in this context is just *ordinary* matter. Antimatter comprises the complementary antiparticles of ordinary matter, but antimatter is itself a form of matter. So converting energy into matter could mean converting it into antimatter just as easily as converting it into ordinary matter.

This is especially demonstrated in the process of pair production, where a high-energy photon (a gamma ray) interacts with a nucleus, spontaneously converting into a particle and its anti-particle counterpart, the classic example being an electron and a positron (the anti-electron). Typically these pairs will, due to their opposite electrical charges, pull each-other together once more and annihilate, forming a gamma ray once again.