One of the most striking images from The Terminator was the weapon he carried and used in his first attempt on Sarah Connor's life: the .45 Longslide, with laser sighting. The gun was likewise such a striking presence on screen it was used on the film's poster.
Terminator was released in 1984, and while laser sights on weapons are common now, when the film was first shown the red laser was able to communicate something subtle and powerful to the audience: this is a machine, deadly accurate and futuristic. It made the Terminator seem other-worldly and terrifying.
Arstechnica found the true story behind the terminator’s laser-sighted gun. It is a gentleman named Ed Reynolds who created that laser. At the time, he has to use He Ne laser, which needs a high voltage power supply.
Jenoptik has opened the doors to a new laser application centre based in the the southern Korean city of Pyeongtaek. The company has invested $4.4 million (€3.4 million) in the centre, which houses laser processing systems ideal for customers looking to do everything from initial testing through to pilot and small production runs. New laser application centre targets the electronics, photovoltaics and flat-panel display markets
Tokyo, Japan, March 8, 2010 – Sony Corporation ('Sony') today announced the development of a RGB laser light source module suitable for large screen projectors such as digital cinema projectors. The module incorporates high power lasers of the three primary colors: Red, Green and Blue (RGB) with a combined output power of 21W (equivalent to 5,000 lumens), in a single package measuring just 530cc, among the industry's smallest.
The newly developed RGB laser module uses semiconductor diodes for the red and blue lasers, and a compact, high power solid-state SHG laser for the green. Both the red and green lasers were developed internally by Sony. The three lasers generate output power of 10W for red, 6W for green, and 5W for blue, resulting in a total of 21W. Furthermore, energy conversion ratios for the lasers range from 15 to 22% (18% on average), representing extremely high efficiency for power visible lasers. This high energy conversion ratio also realizes low energy consumption within the module itself.
On March 4, 2010 IBM scientists today unveiled a significant step towards replacing electrical signals that communicate via copper wires between computer chips with tiny silicon circuits that communicate using pulses of light. As reported in the recent issue of the scientific journal Nature, this is an important advancement in changing the way computer chips talk to each other.
The report on this work, entitled “Reinventing avalanche photodetectors for on-chip optical interconnects” by Solomon Assefa, Fengnian Xia and Yurii A. Vlasov of IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y. is published in March 4 issue of the journal Nature.
La Subterranea is a project that uses a laser to map out underground tunnels.
La Subterranea [is] an ongoing research project which takes its name from a tunnel and viaduct system running underneath and through the city of Guanajuato, Mexico. As riverbed, vehicular thoroughfare, and the historical back alley to the city, La Subterranea has evolved in a state of tension with the city above. Its use, form, and place has shifted over time, registering changing attitudes towards hygiene, shifts in transportation and hydrological infrastructure, and alterations to the natural topography. At present, La Subterranea is embraced as uniquely embedded cultural capital–contributing to the city's designation as a World Heritage Site in 1988–and as a practical solution to the transportation problems in the city center. The authors traveled to Guanajuato and employed High Definition Survey equipment to assemble a precise three-dimensional model of approximately 2 kilometers of the length of La Subterranea. This study has resulted in the first methodical and accurate mapping of this system.
The institute IPHT, in Jena, Germany, has successfully applied the line laser technology from LIMO to crystallization of amorphous silicon solar cells (a-Si). This year LIMO introduced the L³ LIMO Line Laser for processing of thin films (e.g. solar cells).
”With LIMO technology we were able to get 50% higher current in our photovoltaic applications with multi-crystalline silicon thin film solar cells. For the first time we demonstrated an error free production of this new cell type. With this result we have opened the doors for industrial use of this highly efficient solar cell,” said Dr. Fritz Falk from IPHT. Besides the higher efficiency of the solar cells the coating quality was also enhanced.
The L³ LIMO Line Laser technology offers the advantages of laser crystallization without heating the substrate and shorter cycle time per panel (< 30 s).
The Prism is, quite simply, the best laser guitar on the Internet. At least I think so. I hope that you take these instructions and not only make your own, but improve on my design!
I suppose I should clarify what the Prism is: It’s a bit like a guitar with some synthesizer mashed in. It has aspects of a theremin and a laser harp thrown in to boot. In short, it’s not like anything else, and you can use it to make some really neat sounds. Anything from cold Sine and harsh square waves to heavily distorted noise.
At its heart the Prism features a VCO (Voltage Controlled Oscillator), based around the very shiny XR2206 monolithic function generator. The octave range is selected by blocking one of four laser “strings,” and the pitch is controlled by the position of the musician’s hand on the fretboard. The musician has the option of selecting a sine, triangle or square wave. The sine and triangle waves can be skewed using a separate Skew control.
It also has two other controllable oscillators, one acting as an LFO (Low Frequency Oscillator) and the other acting as a Sync generator.
I designed the Prism to plug into any regular guitar amp, with no computer required. In fact, there is no programming involved at all in this project! It is just as portable as a regular guitar, and meant to be used at gigs or wherever else an “alternative” instrument is needed!
OSA will start a service called “Spotlight on Optics“, which is officially coming on July 20, 2009. But there are already some content on the website. Basically, Spotlight on Optics will highlight select articles from the OSA journals and make them freely accessable through Optics InfoBase.
* Spotlight articles will be selected by OSA Topical and Associate Editors to show the breadth and quality of OSA content.
* Each Spotlight article will be made open access and be accompanied by original summaries written in plain English.
* Journal Editors will be encouraged to identify articles for Spotlight that have excellent scientific quality, are representative of the level of work taking place in a specific area, and put other work in perspective.
* Readers will be able to post comments to the Spotlight website, creating the potential for dialogue between author and reader (and among readers).
It will be a great source for finding interesting research works.
