A thin laser gets thinner.Researchers have created a microchip laser that fires an extraordinarily thin beam of high-intensity light. Because the beam can be as narrow as a few tens of nanometers across, it may prove useful for tasks such as writing close-packed data bits onto optical disks and identifying the chemicals making up nanoscale objects, its inventors say. In the past, experimenters have shone micro-laser beams through minute holes to create beams of nanoscale dimensions, notes electrical engineer Kenneth B. Crozier crozier see crosier. of Harvard University Harvard University, mainly at Cambridge, Mass., including Harvard College, the oldest American college. Harvard College Harvard College, originally for men, was founded in 1636 with a grant from the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. . However, the resulting beams were weak. To overcome this problem, he, Harvard physicist Federico Capasso Federico Capasso (Rome, 1949-), a physicist, was one of the inventors of the quantum cascade laser during his work at Bell Laboratories. He is currently on the faculty of Harvard University. He has co-authored over 300 papers, edited four volumes, and holds over 50 US patents. , and their colleagues have interrupted a beam with a pair of close-spaced, rod-shaped gold patches. Fabricated fab·ri·cate tr.v. fab·ri·cat·ed, fab·ri·cat·ing, fab·ri·cates 1. To make; create. 2. To construct by combining or assembling diverse, typically standardized parts: right where the beam emerges from an infrared microlaser, the patches act jointly as a tiny antenna that focuses the laser light. Crozier says that the narrowed beam is hundreds of times as intense as comparably thin beams shone through holes. The Harvard team describes its new device in the Aug. 28 Applied Physics Letters Applied Physics Letters is a weekly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the American Institute of Physics devoted to the publication of new experimental and theoretical papers about applications of physics to science, engineering, and modern technology. .--P.W. |
|
||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion