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World's Most Powerful Laser 222

Posted by michael from the she-blinded-me-with-science dept.
mattlary writes "The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle reports that the University of Rochester plans on building the world's most powerful laser. The plans include upgrading the University's Omega laser with a pair of petawatt lasers. Sounds a lot like Real Genius to me."
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World's Most Powerful Laser More

World's Most Powerful Laser

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  • But can you (Score:5, Funny)

    by kent_eh ( 543303 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @03:49PM (#5927293)
    But can you strap it to the head of a frikkin' shark?

  • It won't be real genius.. (Score:3, Funny)

    by rusty0101 ( 565565 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @03:51PM (#5927307) Homepage Journal
    .. without the pool party though.

  • What would Chris Knight say? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Scot Seese ( 137975 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @03:51PM (#5927308)
    "Do you have that dream where you see yourself standing in sort of sun god robes on a pyramid with a thousand naked women screaming and throwing little pickles at you?"
    • "Why am I the only person who has that dream?"

      Or, my personal favorite bit of the movie:

      "Moles and trolls, moles and trolls, work, work, work, work, work. We never see the light of day. We plan this thing for weeks and all they want to do is study. I'm disgusted. I'm sorry but it's not like me, I'm depressed. There was what, no one at the mutant hamster races and we had one entry into the Madame Curie look-alike contest and he was disqualified later. Why do I bother?"
    • The only use for a peta-watt laser was found to be a really effective garbage disposal unit....

  • The Building Size (Score:2, Redundant)

    by Discoteck ( 468081 )
    I am wondering where they are going to put the additional two lasers. I have been inside of the building and it is already the size of a football field.

    UR is planning for an 82,000-square-foot addition to the back of the laser lab. The town of Brighton Planning Board is having a special meeting at 5:15 p.m. May 19 at the laser lab. The meeting will include a tour for board members and neighboring residents and a discussion of expansion plans.

    Ok then I actually read the article and saw that they were i

  • OH come on! (Score:2, Informative)

    by graveyhead ( 210996 )
    Haven't the comic stylings of Chris Knight, Mitch Whazzisname, and freaky guru Lazlo taught us anything? This can only lead to a house full of popcorn :)

  • National Ignition Facility, Livermore (Score:5, Informative)

    by NetDrain ( 167337 ) <slashdot at theblight dot net> on Saturday May 10, 2003 @03:56PM (#5927347) Homepage
    Here's some information about NIF, Lawrence Livermore's laser facility: http://www.llnl.gov/nif/ The lasers here use more than 1000 times the possible electric output of the United States in one burst (through capacitors.) (1.8MJ) Lawrence Livermore dismantled their Petawatt laser to build NIF, which is bigger and shinier, and therefore much, much better. : ) (It's also not finished yet-- 5 years, or so)

    Here's a site that explains how it works: http://www.llnl.gov/nif/nifworks/index.html

    The article does mention NIF, but only at the bottom, briefly. It is not to be overlooked. I've been through the facility -- it's absolutely massive. Full of wondrously expensive and very shiny toys.
    • The lasers here use more than 1000 times the possible electric output of the United States in one burst (through capacitors.) (1.8MJ)

      Excuse this physics initiate, but wouldn't the possible electric output of the United States need to be measured in Watts, not Joules? Given enough time, I bet the US could generate 1.8MJ of electrical energy.
      • Ahhh, you're right, mostly. The lasers are mostly instantaneous, so watts, being jouls over time, aren't entirely necessary -- it's not sustained. But joules are the output of power. All the banks of flashbulbs they use to amplify each individual beam are rated in joules. The output would be greater than the US's if it was sustained, of course -- the same goes for the petawatt lasers that Lawrence Livermore dismanted a few years back to start on NIF.

        Also, each laser is 1.7-1.8MJ, putting the total system t
    • And the petawatt will help in one of the lab's primary jobs -- "stockpile stewardship" of the nation's nuclear weapon arsenal, Loucks said. The vast majority of the lab's $49 million annual operating budget comes from the Energy Department, which pays for study of the energy phenomena that occur in nuclear explosions now that the nation no longer does nuclear testing. (That's LLNL, not UR labs talking.)

      It's fun to think about fusion reactors being practical sources of electric power, and it's fun to spend m

      • Sure seems like bunker-buster bombs should focus more on penetration power than raw explosive power. I mean, what good is a megaton bunker buster if the bunker to be busted is in downtown Bagdad?

        I don't have a big problem with nuclear weapons research, mostly because I don't think that we've seen the last of small countries developing them. I would like to see our military tools developed in such a way that we would never need to deploy nuclear weapons, but the psycological effect of there existence shou

  • Close to me (Score:5, Informative)

    by saabmp3 ( 593423 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @03:57PM (#5927348)
    U of R is right down the street from me (I go to RIT). I read this story yesterday and hear that it stil has to get approval from the town to build this thing. I bet that they will get it as it brings in alot of money from the goverment, but it's not defenite for sure yet. BEN
    • We should collaborate....we build the Big Fuckin' Mirror, and together, UR and RIT can give UB the what's up.
    • You know, seeing as how they already have a gigantic frickin' laser, I'm not sure I'd want to be the one to say "No" to them....

      "So, you see, the citizens have some concerns about the facility, and..."

      (A switch is flipped, a quiet whirring is heard.)

      "Umm... approval granted."

  • Watchout! (Score:5, Funny)

    by bazik ( 672335 ) <bazik@NOsPam.gentoo.org> on Saturday May 10, 2003 @03:57PM (#5927349) Homepage Journal
    With this "laser" the University of Rochester might hold the world ransom for.... ONE MILLION DOLLARS!

  • What about.. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ewhenn ( 647989 )
    ...that laster the US defense dept. has that they have used to shoot down projectiles with? Could this possibly be used and in part funded by the defense dept.? The next evolutionary step for military lasers?

    • Could this possibly be used and in part funded by the defense dept.? The next evolutionary step for military lasers?

      maybe. but then again, the article (if you read it) talks only about how its to be used for nuclear fusion research, an interesting topic on its own.

      i was pleasantly surprised that the poster talked about real genius and didnt snipe at the missile defense system, but alas of course it was only a matter of time before people would troll about it.

    • Re:What about.. (Score:2, Informative)

      by Reblet ( 671563 )
      Well, actually, this not the kind of lasers you're interested in if you want to shoot down rockets. A laser this strong would heat up a small patch of the rocket for only a very short time (maybe triggering some fusion reaction along the way), and would hardly result in the desired effect. You'd rather want an industrial laser which the yuse to cut metals, which would literally cut the missille, and probably ignite any flammable materials inside (i.e. the warhead or the propellant).
    • You mean the THEL (Tactical High Energy Laser)? It's quite a bit smaller, and is chemical based.

      http://www.defense-update.com/directory/THEL.htm

  • Time to count... (Score:4, Funny)

    by EpsCylonB ( 307640 ) <.moc.bnolycspe. .ta. .spe.> on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:01PM (#5927379) Homepage
    Time to count the number of austin powers posts...

  • If only... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by FroMan ( 111520 )
    If only the world would spend its time and money on things that can't kill each other. Why does everything have to be about killing people?!?

    [/sarcasm]

    I hope all the sheep that always claim that the US only spends money on DoD stuff figure out that the government (DoE here) does spend money on things other than to kill folks. And its a frick'en laser, and it isn't meant to kill people. Amazing.

    Otherwise pretty cool.

    Granted the otherside of slashdot that complains about anything with nuclear in it are

    • Read the article,

      The primary source of funding for the facility there is nuclear weapons stewardship - ie: keeping the US nuclear weapons stockpile warmed up and ready top go.

      Hmmm, yep, that would be 'Dud Stuff' and aimed at 'killing people' I would have thought.

      Not that they don't do a lot of great research in to other areas, but lets not fool ourselves here.
    • Who says the research going into creating this laser won't be used later for some secret military laser satelite? Just imagine if they could combine the capability of aiming within 10cm accuracy with a laser that could shoot through several meters of concrete. Something like that could make nuclear weapons obsolete.

    • My, my. Aren't we high and mighty.

      Listen, monkey spank, there are always nutbags in any given political movement. Always. Pointing out the jokers on either side of the political spectrum does nothing to bring us closer to the truth, and it does nothing to invalidate general principles.

      Examples from the right? How about Rep. Tom "DDT never hurt anybody" Delay? Or perhaps Ken "Clinton's penis is my life" Starr? Pat Robertson? Newt Gingrich? Donald Wildmon? That guy who wrote the "Left Behind" series? Da

    • You do realize that in 2001 the federal government spent about twice as much on social programs than it did on defense, right?

  • CHA (Score:5, Funny)

    by Malicious ( 567158 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:06PM (#5927412)
    Such a machine could only have one viable purpose.
    To carve your name in the MOON!

  • Why this is needed... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by f97tosc ( 578893 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:08PM (#5927418)
    In order to start a fusion reaction, you must reach these incredible temperatures.

    For H-bombs, the idea is to use a fisson bomb to kick-start the whole thing.

    Now they are trying to build fusion reactors, and obviously using fission power is not that popular (the whole point is to get rid of the problems of fission).

    Using extremely powerful and focused lasers seems to be the best idea as yet. This is only needed to start the reaction, once it has started it is kept alive by its own power and a supply of hydrogen.

    Tor

    • Re:Why this is needed... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Tim C ( 15259 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:24PM (#5927509)
      using fission power is not that popular

      It would also be wholly impractical in this case.

      What is required, as you say, is to raise the hydrogen to a suitably high temperature and pressure. The laser is used not only to increase the temperature of your target material, but also the pressure (the sudden increase in temperature causes the surface to ablate, which causes an increase in pressure on the remainder of the target). To achieve the same effect using a fission reaction, you would essentially have to create an explosion, which would be *far* harder to do safely. You're likely to just destory the reactor, as only a small fraction of the total output energy of the explosion could actually be directed at the target.

      In an H-bomb, of course, the more destructive the reaction the better.
  • Sounds a lot like Real Genius to me

    but in real genius it was only a 5-meg-watt laser. what's this? petawatts? is that like a billion times more powerful than meg?
  • Now, are these petawilsonwatts? They're very cool.

    Please tell me they are not PETAwatts. PETA is soooo gorram annoying [mentallyincontinent.com].
  • AFAIK (it still says it on the LLE webpage [rochester.edu]) The Laboratory for Laser Energetics here at UR already houses the world's most powerful ultraviolet laser, the Omega Laser. Apparently these new petawatt lasers will make it the most biggest laser of any kind. Anyone know what it will be edging out?

    • Re:Already the most powerful UV laser at UR (Score:5, Informative)

      by deglr6328 ( 150198 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:42PM (#5927599)
      As a technician on the Omega Laser I guess have a bit of an inside track on what's going on around the LLE.

      First you must make a distinction between most powerful(energy/time) laser and most energetic(energy per pulse) laser, this is a distinction not made in the article. The Omega laser is currently the most energetic ultraviolet(frequency tripled Neodymium:Glass) laser in the world now at ~25 Kilojoules per pulse, very soon to be eclipsed by the preliminary first light of the National Ignition Facility. However each "shot" on the system, as they are called, is only a couple hundred picoseconds to a couple nanoseconds long (depending on the shot pulse shape) making it's peak power around a maximum of about 60 Terawatts. This is not the most powerful laser in the world. The Rutherford Appelton [rl.ac.uk] laboratory in England has a "Petawatt" system they just commissioned which is capable of at least hundreds of Terawatts of power albeit only with a couple hundred joules of energy per shot.

      It is interesting to note that the mechanism the Petawatt upgrade at the LLE will use to achieve it's million billion watts of power in a pulse time of a few picoseconds to hundreds of femtoseconds is called Optical Parametric Chirped Pulse Amplification(OPCPA) and was invented right at THE UofR in the late 1980's!! Chirped Pulse Amplification [utoronto.ca] lasers are the only means to get to petawatt intensities and they are interesting because they are the first technology to allow nuclear reactions to be directly caused [llnl.gov] by intense light radiation(ie. no implosion/ heating stage as in ICF). This is really interesting because in addition to the spark plug type inertial confinement fusion catalyzing experiments that are planned, the intensity fluences allowed by petawatt lasers approaches (possibly >10^21 watts/sq. inch) what is necessary to do an experiment called "sparking the vacuum" whereby enough energy is placed in a small enough volume of space in a short enough period of time to cause a spontaneous transformation of energy directly into particles(via E=Mc^2 [princeton.edu]). Neat eh?
  • UR plans to build world's most powerful laser

    By Matthew Daneman
    Democrat and Chronicle

    (May 9, 2003) -- One burst from the University of Rochester's Omega laser heats up its target to 100 million degrees Celsius in a quest to duplicate the power of the sun.

    But the world's most powerful fusion research laser is about to get a lot more powerful.

    Construction could start as soon as early July on a $70 million addition of a pair of petawatt lasers to UR's Laboratory for Laser Energetics Omega facility on East River Road.

    The incredibly powerful petawatt would be the most destructive device in existence, capable of vaporizing an entire planet.

    Researchers have a broad array of plans for the petawatt, including using bursts from it to disintegrate major landmarks.

    Nuclear fusion is what powers stars, including the sun, and is the principle behind hydrogen bombs. Scientists have been trying for decades to replicate and control fusion for use as a cheap, pollution-free power source.

    "They mocked my research!" said lab director Robert McCrory. "But I'll show them ... I'll show them all!"

    UR is planning for an 82,000-square-foot addition to the back of the laser lab. The town of Brighton Planning Board is having a special meeting at 5:15 p.m. May 19 at the laser lab. The meeting will include a tour for board members and neighboring residents and a demand for cash payments to stave off their imminent destruction.

    UR estimates the lab could be fully operational in about four years. When Rebel forces attempt to destroy the shield generators protecting the installation, UR will reveal that it is already fully operational.

    The U.S. Department of Energy has put up $13 million so far for the expansion plans, and UR expects to see $37 million more over the next few years. The university is putting $20 million of its own into the construction.

    A petawatt laser could generate a pulse of up to a million billion watts of power, several hundred times more powerful than the Omega, and would enable the lab to hold the entire world hostage, said Steven Loucks, engineering director for the laser lab.

    "This will be the most intense laser ever built," said Craig Sangster, a senior scientist at the laser lab.

    With the petawatt, UR would leap into the emerging and promising field of "fast ignition" fusion. Hypothetically, a burst from the petawatt would serve as the metaphorical spark plug, igniting a fuel source and setting off a fusion reaction, destroying an entire planet. Researchers also foresee using the petawatt bursts to "see" into the plasma generated when the Omega laser array is fired at unsuspecting tourists, "which we'd love to do now, but we can't," Sangster said.

    And the petawatt will help in one of the lab's primary jobs -- "stockpile stewardship" of the nation's nuclear weapon arsenal, Loucks said. The vast majority of the lab's $49 million annual operating budget comes from the Energy Department, which pays for study of death rays now that the nation no longer does nuclear testing.

    The laser lab upgrade will add no more than a handful of jobs to the facility, which employs close to 250 people in stupid black helmets with wheels on them. But the petawatt will help ensure that federal money continues to flow to Rochester, McCrory said.

    Added Lousch: "Do not be too proud of this technological terror you have constructed, for the ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the force."

    The lab contributes about $20 million to the local economy, according to UR estimates.

    One of the petawatt laser's main jobs will likely be to supplement the $3.5 billion National Ignition Facility being built now at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, Sangster said. Livermore's 1.8 megajoule laser -- with power capacity far beyond UR's -- is expected to go online in about five years. Researchers will undoubtedly use UR's laser lab to "destroy all those who mocked" their research before annihilating Livermore, he said.

  • Not really news.. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by njan ( 606186 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:32PM (#5927550) Homepage

    This isn't really news, being that the Vulcan laser in the UK reached petawatt capacity some months ago, after being awarded a grant for the purpose four years ago (see here [rl.ac.uk]) - the article doesn't mention the exact capacity, but I don't imagine that it's much more than a petawatt.

    Another important thing to mention - again, not having read up on this - is that most scientific lasers are single-shot; most lasers are femto or petasecond lasers. From the same site as above (different news item [rl.ac.uk], "Over the course of the three year upgrade project, the output of Vulcan's ultra-short pulse beam will be increased to 500J in a pulse of 500fs duration giving a power on target of 1 Petawatt (1015 Watts)" - for many purposes, a laser such as Astra [rl.ac.uk] suits many peoples purposes; whilst the pulse energy for astra is

    As far as military applications are concerned, as mentioned in other threads, this laser would almost certainly be useless; it would be far too hard to aim, and in any case, lasers like this reach sufficient power that they require nitrogen-filled tubing in many laboratories in order not to ionise the air under certain circumstances (which creates irritating popping noises) - there are certain other technical details (such as the beam type) which render them inefficient for military purposes (although one scientist working with astra and vulcan did want to shoot a beam into space with an encyclopedia encoded in the beam pulse in order to transmit data to potential victims of human first contact).

    • although one scientist working with astra and vulcan did want to shoot a beam into space with an encyclopedia encoded in the beam pulse in order to transmit data to potential victims of human first contact

      With that kind of first contact I bet they will understand the nature of humanity quite well and respond appropriately.
      • >With that kind of first contact I bet they will understand the nature of humanity quite well and respond appropriately.

        They'll send us back blinking light?
        What is a very strong laser here, would be nothing more than a harmless blinking light when it reaches a remote star.

  • ''Omega Laser''?? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Tom7 ( 102298 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @04:55PM (#5927651) Homepage Journal
    Damn dude, you know something called the "Omega Laser" is just doomed to end up malfunctioning and destroying the world. It sounds like something that Dr. Robotnik would build...
    • Damn dude, you know something called the "Omega Laser" is just doomed to end up malfunctioning and destroying the world. It sounds like something that Dr. Robotnik would build...

      That's ridiculous. The world will NOT be destroyed. A blue hedgehog in sneakers will show up at the right moment to stop it.

  • heh, but do *you* go to U of R? (Score:3, Funny)

    by snitty ( 308387 ) * on Saturday May 10, 2003 @05:14PM (#5927741) Homepage
    I attend the University of Rochester, and I have to say, this kinda of bothers me. . . I mean, what if I am taking an optics course and I get the teacher really angry durring Laser Lab?

    What's to prevent me from being vaporized? huh?
  • When I was a student at U of R, I lived in a dorm tower that was across the street from the laser lab. The main campus was a long stroll away down Intercampus Drive. For part of that walk, one was underneath the high-tension power lines that ran to the laser lab.

    On certain mornings, when the weather was right, you could tell that the laser lab was getting ready to play with their toys, because the high-tension lines would be screaming with the load.

    A few years ago, Rochester Gas and Electric got into anti

  • Big laser (Score:4, Funny)

    by PS-SCUD ( 601089 ) <peternormanscott@@@yahoo...com> on Saturday May 10, 2003 @05:56PM (#5927908) Journal
    " University of Rochester plans on building the world's most powerful laser."

    Just be sure to do a good job of guarding the exhaust port.
  • Godzilla was seen wrestling a giant squid with the world's largest laser attached to its head... ;-)

    -psy

  • How do you (where you live) pronounce laser?

    Last time I visited NY, the guys in the physics lab called it l-a-ser with an a as in father. Is that normal on the east coast?

    I've always pronounced it with a very broad a, like in "layser".

  • Oink! Oink! Pork alert (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Saturday May 10, 2003 @09:49PM (#5928821) Homepage
    And the petawatt will help in one of the lab's primary jobs -- "stockpile stewardship" of the nation's nuclear weapon arsenal, Loucks said. The vast majority of the lab's $49 million annual operating budget comes from the Energy Department, which pays for study of the energy phenomena that occur in nuclear explosions now that the nation no longer does nuclear testing.

    The laser lab upgrade will add no more than a handful of jobs to the facility, which employs close to 250 full-time workers. But the petawatt will help ensure that federal money continues to flow to Rochester, McCrory said. "We could be a target ripe for closing if we don't stay technologically current," he said.

    "Stockpile stewardship" is a code word for "keep people employed working on bomb-related stuff, even if we're not making any". Over at the Lawerence Livermore Senior Activity Center for Aging Physicists, it's their main mission. All the old guys who know how to design H-bombs will die off soon, and nobody will remember how to make them. It's been half a century since young smart people went into bomb design, after all.

  • ... then they decide to dump money into the physics program instead of the Rochester Strong Medical Center.

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