News tagged with laser beams

Related topics: atoms

MIT researchers discover new way of producing electricity

(PhysOrg.com) -- A team of scientists at MIT have discovered a previously unknown phenomenon that can cause powerful waves of energy to shoot through minuscule wires known as carbon nanotubes. The discovery ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Mar 07, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (75) | comments 17 | with audio podcast

New hope for ultimate clean energy: fusion power

(PhysOrg.com) -- Imagine if you could generate electricity using nuclear power that emitted no radioactivity: it would be the answer to the world's dream of finding a clean, sustainable energy source.

Physics / General Physics

created Apr 12, 2010 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (58) | comments 65 | with audio podcast

Tractor beams come to life

Tractor beams, energy rays that can move objects, are a science fiction mainstay. But now they are becoming a reality -- at least for moving very tiny objects.

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 08, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (47) | comments 13 | with audio podcast

Seeing quantum mechanics with the naked eye

(PhysOrg.com) -- A Cambridge team have built a semiconductor chip that converts electrons into a quantum state that emits light but is large enough to see by eye. Because their quantum superfluid is simply ...

Physics / Quantum Physics

created Jan 09, 2012 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (44) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Scientists build world's first anti-laser

More than 50 years after the invention of the laser, scientists at Yale University have built the world's first anti-laser, in which incoming beams of light interfere with one another in such a way as to perfectly ...

Physics / General Physics

created Feb 17, 2011 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (44) | comments 18 | with audio podcast

Physicists prove Einstein wrong with observation of instantaneous velocity in Brownian particles

A century after Albert Einstein said we would never be able to observe the instantaneous velocity of tiny particles as they randomly shake and shimmy, so called Brownian motion, physicist Mark Raizen and his ...

Physics / General Physics

created May 20, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (44) | comments 32 | with audio podcast

Regular Light Bulbs Made Super-Efficient with Ultra-Fast Laser

(PhysOrg.com) -- An ultra-powerful laser can turn regular incandescent light bulbs into power-sippers, say optics researchers at the University of Rochester. The process could make a light as bright as a 100-watt ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created May 29, 2009 | popularity 4.4 / 5 (42) | comments 23

Success in 'space elevator' competition (Update 3)

(AP) -- A robot powered by a ground-based laser beam climbed a long cable dangling from a helicopter on Wednesday to qualify for prize money in a $2 million competition to test the potential reality of the ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Nov 05, 2009 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (39) | comments 54

Glasperlenspiel: Scientists propose new test for gravity

A new experiment proposed* by physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology may allow researchers to test the effects of gravity with unprecedented precision at very short distances -- a ...

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 01, 2010 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (37) | comments 105 | with audio podcast

Scientists Generate Black Hole Radiation in the Lab

(PhysOrg.com) -- Due to their violent nature and long distance from Earth, black holes and their surroundings are very difficult to study. Currently, the main method to observe a black hole is to use an X-ray ...

Physics / Plasma Physics

created Dec 07, 2009 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (35) | comments 11 feature

3D-printer with nano-precision

Printing three dimensional objects with incredibly fine details is now possible using "two-photon lithography". With this technology, tiny structures on a nanometer scale can be fabricated. Researchers at ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Mar 13, 2012 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (29) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

Gravity up close: Looking for extra dimensions by measuring gravity at the microscopic level

Scientists know how gravity works at big distances -- the inter-planetary or inter-stellar range -- but does it work the same way at the inter-atomic range?

Physics / General Physics

created Oct 13, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (30) | comments 23 | with audio podcast

Scientists examine possibility of a phonon laser, or 'phaser'

(PhysOrg.com) -- While the optical laser celebrated its 50th anniversary earlier this year, some scientists have been working on a new type of coherent beam amplifier for sound rather than light. Scientists ...

Physics / General Physics

created Sep 07, 2010 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (29) | comments 25 | with audio podcast feature

Scientists Produce Unprecedented 1 Megajoule Laser Shot, Step Towards Fusion Ignition

US scientists have produced a laser shot with an unprecedented energy level that could be a key step towards nuclear fusion, the US National Nuclear Security Administration said Wednesday.

Physics / General Physics

created Jan 28, 2010 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (29) | comments 17 | with audio podcast

Made to order diamonds hold key to stunning laser discoveries

(PhysOrg.com) -- Diamond is best known for being a prized gem and the hardest cutting element available, but now thanks to research being carried out at Macquarie University it is also proving to be a super ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created Apr 22, 2010 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (26) | comments 7 | with audio podcast