News tagged with light beams

Photonics: Beam me up

'Tractor beams' of light that pull objects towards them are no longer science fiction. Haifeng Wang at the A*STAR Data Storage Institute and co-workers have now demonstrated how a tractor beam can in fact be realized on a ...

Physics / General Physics

created May 24, 2012 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (6) | comments 0

New microscope uses rainbow of light to image the flow of individual blood cells

Blood tests convey vital medical information, but the sight of a needle often causes anxiety and results take time. A new device developed by a team of researchers in Israel, however, can reveal much the same ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created May 21, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Physicists turn to Maxwell’s equations for self-bending light

(Phys.org) -- Can light self-bend into an arc? Can shape-preserving optical beams truly bend along a circular path? A confident answer emerged in this week’s Physical Review Letters. Researchers at Israel’s Techni ...

Physics / General Physics

created Apr 21, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (30) | comments 27 | with audio podcast weblog

NASA engineers testing Webb telescope's OSIM and BIA instruments

(Phys.org) -- Several critical items related to NASA's next-generation James Webb Space Telescope are being tested in the giant thermal vacuum test chamber at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Apr 12, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 1

Measuring magnetic fields

(Phys.org) -- Polarized light is a familiar phenomenon, as people who prefer polarized sunglasses can testify. The electric field in a beam of light can vibrate either left-right or up-down, and the scattering ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Apr 09, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Ultrafast sonograms shed new light on rapid phase transitions

An international team of physicists has developed a method for taking ultrafast 'sonograms' that can track the structural changes that take place within solid materials in trillionth-of-a-second intervals ...

Physics / General Physics

created Mar 08, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Finding explosives with laser beams

Scientists at Vienna University of Technology have found a way to detect chemicals over long distances, even if they are enclosed in containers.

Technology / Engineering

created Feb 27, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Novel link between optical fibers, nanometer-scale silicon structures could aid development of integrated optical circui

Silicon is a unique material that has revolutionized electronics; it enables engineers to put millions of electrical devices onto a single chip. Replacing the electrical currents in this technology with beams ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created Feb 17, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Virtual ghost imaging: New technique enables imaging even through highly adverse conditions

Ghost imaging (GI), and its even more oddly named cousin virtual ghost imaging (VGI), seem to contradict conventional wisdom by being able to image an object by simply counting photons in a "light bucket." This non-intuitive ...

Physics / General Physics

created Feb 15, 2012 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (7) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Physicists build highly efficient 'no-waste' laser

A team of University of California, San Diego researchers has built the smallest room-temperature nanolaser to date, as well as an even more startling device: a highly efficient, "thresholdless" laser that ...

Physics / General Physics

created Feb 08, 2012 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (23) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

ESO team succeeds in linking telescopes at Paranal Observatory into giant VLT

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers working as part of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) at the Cerra Paranal Mountain Observatory in the Atacama Desert in Chile, have succeeded in virtually connecting all ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Feb 06, 2012 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (19) | comments 2 | with audio podcast report

Researchers at SLAC test collider closer to creating fully coherent X-rays

(PhysOrg.com) -- Many advanced laser technologies, such as laser spectroscopy, that use precise wavelengths of infrared, visible or ultraviolet laser light could benefit from using X-ray light as well. But ...

Physics / General Physics

created Feb 01, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Ultra-fast photodetector and terahertz generator

Photodetectors made from graphene can process and conduct light signals as well as electric signals extremely fast. Within picoseconds the optical stimulation of graphene generates a photocurrent. Until now, ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Jan 31, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (9) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Flipping an egg carton of light traps giant atoms

(PhysOrg.com) -- In an egg carton of laser light, University of Michigan physicists can trap giant Rydberg atoms with up to 90 percent efficiency, an achievement that could advance quantum computing and terahertz ...

Physics / General Physics

created Dec 23, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 7 | with audio podcast

Nanometer-scale growth of cone cells tracked in living human eye

Humans see color thanks to cone cells, specialized light-sensing neurons located in the retina along the inner surface of the eyeball. The actual light-sensing section of these cells is called the outer segment, which is ...

Physics / Optics & Photonics

created Dec 20, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 15