[modi123_1]

Go read the awesome solution without a problem below! While you are doing that what sort of tech or object really really needs an anti-<object name>? Antisharks? Anti-gasoline? I want to hear anti- object comments and fantastical applications!


http://www.wired.com...live-antilaser/

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Less than a year after it was first suggested, the world’s first antilaser is here. A team of physicists have built a contraption that, instead of flashing bright beams, utterly extinguishes specific wavelengths of light.

Laser refresher:

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Conventional lasers create intense beams of light by stimulating atoms to spit out a coherent beam of light in which all the light waves march in lockstep. The crests of one wave match the crests of all the others, and troughs match up with troughs.

I bet the 'bizarro' laser has a funny goatee, or is gray and talks funny.

Quote

The antilaser does the reverse: Two perfect beams of laser light go in, and are completely absorbed.

“There will be nothing coming out again,” said experimental physicist Hui Cao of Yale University, whose research group built the new device.

Output:

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the light waves canceled each other out. The silicon absorbed the light and converted it to another form of energy, like heat or electrical current.

Ohh.. that's dark!

Quote

Theoretically, 99.999 percent of the light can be extinguished. Because of the physical limitations of the laser and the silicon wafer, the antilaser only absorbed 99.4 percent of the light.

Application.

Quote

The device may find uses in optical switches for future superfast computer boards that use light instead of electrons. It may also have medical applications, such as imaging a tumor through normally opaque human tissue

Edit: I think there is a large untapped market for a new genre of cinematography dedicated to the anti-fap technique users. (double entendre indended)

This post has been edited by modi123_1: 18 February 2011 - 09:58 AM

[BenignDesign]

We need anti-moron sensors. My day will go much smoother when I receive advance warning of an impending moron approach.

[modi123_1]

Wouldn't an anti-moron sensor detect the opposite of moron? The least moronic the more the sensor pings?

[Creecher]

They should point that at the sun.

[hookiethe1]

So, is this going to result in some sort of coating for cars? That would be beneficial. I guess it could be used for wireless power transmission, but that would be less exciting.

[modi123_1]

The applications are outlined at the bottom. Laser switches and cancer killing.

[hookiethe1]

I know, but I was looking beyond those for something remotely interesting. Not even cancer killing, just imaging.

This post has been edited by hookiethe1: 18 February 2011 - 10:38 AM

[modi123_1]

Ah.. well maybe a new heat weapon. No annoying red dot to give away your location!

[tlhIn`toq]

Quote

Because of the physical limitations of the laser and the silicon wafer, the antilaser only absorbed 99.4 percent of the light.

Quote

the light waves canceled each other out. The silicon absorbed the light and converted it to another form of energy, like heat or electrical current.

This sounds like a 99.4% effective solar panel, some day. I'd love to line my roof with them. The net effect should be electrical production while at the same time no heat absorption so I have to use less power to cool the house in the summer time.

[BenignDesign]

modi123_1, on 18 February 2011 - 12:06 PM, said:

Wouldn't an anti-moron sensor detect the opposite of moron? The least moronic the more the sensor pings?

In which case, all sensors would fall silent when you entered the room.

[modi123_1]

Wow... can I borrow some topical cream for that savage first degree burn I just received? Rhythm is a dancer!

[Craig328]

tlhIn`toq, on 18 February 2011 - 01:08 PM, said:

This sounds like a 99.4% effective solar panel, some day. I'd love to line my roof with them. The net effect should be electrical production while at the same time no heat absorption so I have to use less power to cool the house in the summer time.

I was kind of thinking along the same lines. It's the 99.4% efficiency in converting light to some other form of energy that got my attention. The trick is that visible light is all over the frequency spectrum and it would appear these devices work on only a single frequency. However, I suspect that might could be enhanced with the application of a prism (to enrich the resultant light of the frequency needed for the device to work) and some additional technology.

Sunlight is free, breaking it down in a much smaller frequency segment costs as much as a prism does...seems like it'd be most of the way toward an efficient energy converter. If they could come up with one that worked with infrared light then any source of heat should also be a reasonable supplier to the right device.

[hookiethe1]

^That's also why one of my first thoughts was power transmission, you could beam power to anywhere within a line of sight and have only .6% losses? Sounds good to me, but of course that doesn't account for the efficiency of the laser generating end.

[tlhIn`toq]

hookiethe1, on 18 February 2011 - 01:46 PM, said:

^That's also why one of my first thoughts was power transmission, you could beam power to anywhere within a line of sight and have only .6% losses? Sounds good to me, but of course that doesn't account for the efficiency of the laser generating end.

You still have issues/loss from spread/dispersal of the originating beam. This was talked about decades ago when Reagan was in office. The plan was to put a solar energy satellite with massive collector panels into orbit so it was not hampered by atmospheric conditions, then beam the energy to ground as microwaves where it would be recollected.

A major problem problem was dispersal. It was really only good if you had a collector about sq.mi. in diameter, and an even larger area to put it in so you didn't microwave all the people in the surrounding area. There are vast areas of Mohave desert that could work, as long as you also cleared a large area of airspace as well so you didn't fry lots of airplanes.

In the end a lot of other countries saw it as a possible energy beam weapon. So much for the famed Star Wars Program.

[Craig328]

Good delivery from space


Not so good delivery from space

/everything I know about microwave power transmission, I learned from SimCity