Fifty years after the invention of the laser, a team of scientists from Yale University (USA) has builtthe world’s first anti-laser. The deviceabsorbs incoming laser beams and transforms the light energy from these beams into electrical or thermal energy, according to A. Douglas Stone, a researcher at Yale University (USA), in statements to the SINC Agency.
The mechanism, called a “perfect coherence damper” (CPA), focuses two laser beams with a specific frequency into a cavity that contains a disk of silicon as a semiconductor material. The disk aligns the light waves, which bounce indefinitely until they are absorbed and transformed into heat, as exposes the article published today inScience.
A backwards laser
Half a century after the invention of the laser, “anti-laser performs a fundamental optical process that has not been studied until now,” says Stone. It is, therefore, a laser that works in reverse:absorbs light at specific frequencies instead of emitting it. The device measures about a centimeter in diameter, although scientists hope to build one as small as six microns. At the moment, the anti-laser absorbs 99.4% of the incoming light, although it should be able to absorb 99.999%.
Thenext generation of computersKnown as “optics,” you could use this new technology in switches, detectors and various components. In addition, anti-laser could be applied in the field ofradiology, by directing electromagnetic radiation to a region of opaque human tissues. In this way, medical images could be obtained or the mechanism used for therapeutic purposes.
