'Laser within a laser' could take out bombs and explosive-laden vehicles.Byline: ANI Washington, April 27 (ANI): Reports indicate that the US Army is working on developing a laser within a laser that could blow up roadside bombs and explosive-laden vehicles from a distance. A side effect of high-energy lasers is that they heat up and ionize i·on·ize v. To dissociate atoms or molecules into electrically charged atoms or radicals. i  on·iz the air molecules they pass through.
For a brief moment after the laser beam has stopped firing, a long narrow tube of ionized i·on·ize tr. & intr.v. i·on·ized, i·on·iz·ing, i·on·iz·es To convert or be converted totally or partially into ions. i plasmas hangs in the air - a perfect conductor A perfect conductor is an electrical conductor with no resistivity. The concept is used to model systems in which the electrical resistance or resistivity is negligible compared to other effects. One such model is ideal magnetohydrodynamics, the study of perfectly conductive fluids. for any kind of electromagnetic pulse you may want to send through it. Now, according to a report in Wired News, researchers at the Army's Armament Research Development and Engineering Center (ARDEC ARDEC Armament Research Development and Engineering Center (US Army) ARDEC Agence Rwandaise pour le Développement et la Coopération ) in Picatinny, New Jersey have another idea - super high-energy microwaves. Microwave weapons already have been tried, but not really used, because the beams scatter so much that there's a high risk of "self kill" to nearby personnel. Meanwhile, lasers are well understood, but need tremendous amounts of energy to even approach being dangerous. So, the ARDEC crew is combining the best of both worlds - using a laser to create a focused plasma channel microwaves can't escape, then firing microwaves down it. Called the Multimode Directed Energy Armament System by the researchers, the weapon "defeats/neutralize full spectrum of materiel ma·te·ri·el or ma·té·ri·el n. The equipment, apparatus, and supplies of a military force or other organization. See Synonyms at equipment. threats at stand off" and have "scalable effects from non-lethal to lethal." (ANI) Copyright 2009 Asian News International The Asian News International (ANI) agency provides multimedia news to China and 50 bureaus in India. It covers virtually all of South Asia since its foundation and presently claims, on its official website, to be the leading South Asia-wide news agency. (ANI) - All Rights Reserved. Provided by Syndigate.info an Albawaba.com company |
|
||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion