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Pair production is the creation of a particle and its antiparticle from a neutral boson, such as creation of an electron and positron from a photon passing near a nucleus. Pair production occurs in some astronomical phenomena and is considered potentially significant in supernovae.
The interaction between boson and particle must have sufficient energy to provide the (rest) mass of the two resulting particles, which is considerable energy, e.g., at least 1.022 MeV to produce the electron/positron pair, and much more to create protons, neutrons, etc. This is in the gamma-ray photon-energy range, and is the same amount of energy expected from annihilation of such a pair. Photon-photon pair production is the inverse of particle-antiparticle annihilation, e.g., of an electron and positron pair, i.e., the creation of such a pair from the interaction of two photons, each with half the total energy.