Ray of Light - Lasers take light shows to a new level.
Ziff Davis Smart Business for the New Economy, March 1, 2001 p46
By Jason Beaver
2001 Low-energy lasers become common surgical tools.
2004 Massive capacity laser storage devices begin replacing hard drives.
2006 Laser guns become a common fixture on the battlefield and in the air.
2010 All-photonic networks deliver Internet services at light speed.
Once confined strictly to the pages of sci-fi comic books, lasers are now everywhere. CD players, presentation pointers, and even kids' toys use them. But the upcoming impact of these light-based technologies might surprise you.
For 20 years, lasers have quietly powered the fiber-optic networks that carry our ground-based communications around the world. They are used to power information along miles of glass filaments, but new research conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is working to bypass the fiber optics and transfer the information inside the laser itself.
"One of our biggest activities is using lasers to create an all- photonic network," says Roger Sudbury, executive officer at MIT's Lincoln Laboratory. Most communications networks have to convert photons to electricity along the network. The all-photonic network would increase transfer capacities to 100Gbps using a totally frictionless stream of pure light.
The idea of storing information in light is not new. Gordon Gould, who invented the laser in 1957, says, "Lasers have yet to be put to much use as memory devices for computers. Lasers could create a massless information storage system."
The benefits of lasers could be even more dramatic in the medical field. Already, laser surgery is performed millions of times each year, but until the past decade, it was mostly for cosmetic purposes. Now doctors at the Oregon Stroke Center in Portland are using lasers to restore blood flow to the brain in stroke victims.
"Using lasers we are able to vaporize the blood clot, and in doing so we are able to open the blood vessel," says Dr. Wayne Clark, the team leader. "The current drug used for this, tPA, takes up to two hours to nibble away at the clot, and the laser takes only 30 to 40 seconds. Time equals brain. If we're saving two hours, then that is all brain that will still be alive." It's the difference between full recovery and permanent disability.
There's also the serious sci-fi stuff. David Schwoegler of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory says, "Most stories would look great if we had a laser weapon-a weapon that shot things and zapped them from space." Until recently, however, most researchers believed lasers weren't suited to this application. But aerospace company TRW has mastered the physics and created the Tactical High Energy Laser, the world's first laser weapon to detect, track, and destroy multiple targets in a single engagement.
"The THEL is really focused as a defensive weapon," says Dr. Tom Romesser, vice president and deputy general manager for laser programs at TRW's Space & Laser Programs Division. "The THEL is made to be used against the Katyusha missiles, which are a problem in Israel."
But Romesser sees a broader application for the technology. He believes the lasers can take out artillery and mortar weapons as well as unmanned aerial vehicles. "I think in five years we'll be able to move the THEL system around on the battlefield and the airborne laser will be flying around to address SCUD-type missiles." TRW is scheduled to produce its airborne laser by 2006. |
