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Toys Science Technology

How The Latest in High Tech Works 93

Posted by Zonk from the all-done-with-mirrors dept.
Popular Science has up a feature looking at "how it works", examining the innards of several new technology-based innovations. We've talked about the Sayaka endoscope in a pill, but did you know it captures images in 360 degrees? We've discussed the adorable little Pleo dino-bot, but did you know how adaptive it is to stimuli? And what about the tank-burning laser that can be fired from an airplane? Well, we haven't discussed that but I'm at a loss as to explain why. "A kind of reverse telescope called the beam expander inside a retractable, swiveling pod called the turret widens the beam to 20 inches and aims it. The laser's computer determines the distance to the target and adjusts the beam so it condenses into a focused point at just the right spot. Tracking computers help make microscopic adjustments to compensate for both the airplane's and the target's movement. A burst of a few seconds' duration will burn a several-inch-wide hole in whatever it hits."
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How The Latest in High Tech Works More

How The Latest in High Tech Works

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  • Anti-personnel weapon (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Chrisq ( 894406 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @06:44AM (#22771854)
    The laser would make a great assassination weapon. Though I find the idea of assassinating enemy leaders remotely somewhat distasteful it would be better if they could just take them out, and not them together with their family and next-door neighbours as seems to happen sometimes with the drone missiles.

    • Re:Anti-personnel weapon (Score:4, Informative)

      by hitmark ( 640295 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @06:48AM (#22771876) Journal
      hmm, a few seconds sounds like a nasty long time if you want to assassinate someone...
      • I'm betting that something that takes a few seconds to go through armor would go through flesh like nobody's business.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by hitmark ( 640295 )
          heh, you may well have a point there.

          also, whats the temp in C that blood boils?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by TheLink ( 130905 )
            If there is a storm cloud at a convenient location you could fire the laser to create an ionized path from cloud to target and make it look like lightning did it. Problem is lightning is not very good at killing so if people are nearby the target could be resuscitated.
            • Not after being hit with MW-range laser beam miliseconds prior to lightning strike...
            • Yea, until you notice the HOLE that it made.

              Please take note that people hit by lightning typically not only survive, but are burned. They don't get giant holes in their heads.

              Really, check it out yourself: http://www.getreadygear.com/index.asp?ID=36&PageAction=Custom [getreadygear.com]
              "However, only ten percent of persons struck by lightning die, with cardiac arrest essentially being the only immediate cause, other than from a secondary cause such as a fall or collision with a rock after being struck first. The surprisi

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by amh131 ( 126681 )
            Just a guess, but probably pretty close to 100 C. Maybe a bit more what with all the salts and stuff in solution. 100 is a good ballpark though.

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by aszaidi ( 464751 )
            Have you tried mkstemp()? Something like this should do:

            fd = mkstemp(poor_sod);
            blood_boil(fd);
      • bin Laden: Achmed, is it hot in here?
        Achmed: No hotter than usual, my Sheikh.
        bin Laden: Pass me water!
        Achmed: [passes glass]
        bin Laden: No! Bring me the bucket! [Grabs it an empties if over himself, runs outside and explodes]
    • But then we wouldn't need to use all those other crazy new weapons we're always making, and wars wouldn't last long enough to subvert civil rights back home.

  • I know of... (Score:4, Funny)

    by interactive_civilian ( 205158 ) <mamoru&gmail,com> on Monday March 17, 2008 @06:44AM (#22771856) Homepage Journal
    I know of a worthwhile house to target, if someone can come up with enough popcorn.

  • Lasers in war? (Score:1, Interesting)

    by IRGlover ( 1096317 )
    I thought that the use of lasers was outlawed by international conventions. Though perhaps that is only against direct use on people (such as pilots) and not on materiel.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by arachnoprobe ( 945081 )
      Laser to blind people or have other longtime effects (except death, "normal injury" comparable to bullets) on enemy soldiers are outlawed. http://www.potomacinstitute.org/publications/waypoint/Laser%20Waypoint%20Issue.pdf [potomacinstitute.org]

      • Re:Lasers in war? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Sterrance ( 1257342 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @07:03AM (#22771932)
        Thank god, cause I'd much rather be dead than blind.
        • For the most part, you would.

          When the conventions on using lasers and so on was created, the types of lasers available where mostly one that would take a long time to do much damage. It would be like going blind by having your eyes melted from your head which is something I would rather not experience. In battle, if you injure a person to a point he can't fight you, it take two or three people to attend to him. This is why this is important. Using a laser to sweep a column of advancing troops to burn they e
          • "Using a laser to sweep a column of advancing troops to burn they eyes out of their sockets just to tie up the other half of the advancing force would be inhumane treatment."

            this statement seems silly, equally so does this one:

            "Using a gun to sweep a column of advancing troops to wound them just to tie up the other half of the advancing force would not be inhumane treatment."

            i don't see how either statement makes much sense, although war in general makes little sense to me as well.
            • The sense is the intent. If you intent to maim someone so they live a life of misery, it is like you are dealing out punishment. If you intent to kill them, you are fighting a war.

              It is probably the idea that war in itself doesn't make much sense to you that has you confuses. But think of it this way, which is worse, someone who regardless of how they justify it, goes around cutting the legs and eyes off of people for whatever reason or a someone who shoots someone and kills them for the same reason. You mi
              • "The sense is the intent. "

                and in war the intent is to disable the other side moreso than killing them outright, as it takes up more resources and makes the other side more willing to give up if their soldiers are wounded rather than dead (morale and so).

                so blinding the regiment (or whatever) WOULD be more effective by using lasers than conventional bullets.

                "Would it be more humane for you to shoot a sick god "

                freudian slip? i think you meant dog, but in this example if your intent is to kill the animal, yo

                • and in war the intent is to disable the other side moreso than killing them outright, as it takes up more resources and makes the other side more willing to give up if their soldiers are wounded rather than dead (morale and so).

                  In modern war, the civilized nations have created rules. they are called the ruled of war. The intent of these rules is to minimize inhumane treatment of prisoners, soldiers, civilians and so on. They outlawed chemical weapons for the same reasons as lasers a long time ago.

                  so blin

                  • Can you make war suck more?
                    A specific example that leaps to mind is glass. Glass weapons of any kind are forbidden. You can't find glass on a x-ray.

          • In war, you never want it to become acceptable to maim someone as a strategy. At least with death, you won't have to suffer as much

            A wise man (well, a character) once said something I find truly compelling. Here it is: "When you're dead, you're fucking dead."

            When you're dead, you wouldn't rather anything. Because you're dead.

            That's why cops don't shoot to wound, they wait until it is absolutely necessary and then shoot to remove the threat which usually means shoot to kill.

            Cops don't shoot to wound because someone who has been shot can sue you.

            That is very inconvenient. So it is best to only shoot people if you plan to kill them.

            Incidentally, you should never point a gun at anyone or any animal you don't intend to kill. This is one of those firearm rules that one learns early

            • seriously, would you rather be dead or laying "consious" in a field with your eyes melted out of your skull and third degree burns over a good portion of your body with flys and other bugs feasting on your remains until someone decides it is safe enough to come get you? There are some things, most people wouldn't want to live through.

              Cops don't shoot to wound because someone who has been shot can sue you.

              That is very inconvenient. So it is best to only shoot people if you plan to kill them.

              It has only be

              • It has only been recently that cops can be sued. And when they are sued, it is for the same reasons I mentioned. This probably means that cops have started to forget this and people are reminding them.

                You could always take cops to civil court. They could always be tried for their crimes, although they seldom are. (For instance, one here in my town repeatedly caught poking underage girls while both were under the influence of meth that he provided has never been tried or even arrested and was still working on the force last I heard, although basically everyone knows about it straight from other cops.) But what I was talking about was people suing the county, city or municipality. The Federal government

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by IRGlover ( 1096317 )
        But if you are burning holes in vehicles there is the possiblity that you end up maiming someone inside when the beam penetrates. I think that a few issues are being side-stepped here!

        • Laser to blind people or have other longtime effects (except death, "normal injury" comparable to bullets) on enemy soldiers are outlawed. http://www.potomacinstitute.org/publications/waypoint/Laser%20Waypoint%20Issue.pdf [potomacinstitute.org] [potomacinstitute.org]
          • I don't see your point in highlighting that part of the post. Maiming is not killing, by its very definition! In this case, the laser could burn off a crew member's leg (which would have a comparable long-term effect to being shot and losing the use of the leg).

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Enleth ( 947766 )
          Somehow I get this weird feeling that this is exactly the point of this thing being there at all. And, honestly, I can imagine a missle maiming someone inside the target vehicle just as happily as this contraption and I don't think a soldier will give a crap wether his leg was torn off by decompression of high-pressue gas or burnt off by a focused beam of photons. Either way it's a leg off. Actually, the latter is a bit better, because it gives a higher chance of surviving a not-quite-direct hit - the laser
          • If you lose a limb by having a focused beam cut it off, will the wound be cauterized? The sounds much better than a sabot round or a grenade. If I'm using laser-precise weapons on a tank, though, I'm not aiming at the people inside. I'm aiming at the fuel, the engine, the main gun, or the munitions.
            • "If you lose a limb by having a focused beam cut it off, will the wound be cauterized?"

              Yes, lasers don't "cut" as you traditionally use the word, a more precise term would be vaporize.

              When i worked at a laser company the tech would often get burned by the CO2 lasers (because the beam is invisible) and the skin that had burned had literally turned to ash.

          • the laser burns only the 50.8-cm area it hits

            If the laser energy was spread over 50cm+ it wouldn't do a whole lot of damage.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by HTH NE1 ( 675604 )

        Laser to blind people or have other longtime effects (except death, "normal injury" comparable to bullets) on enemy soldiers are outlawed.
        If that is their only effect. They can deploy lasers designed to destroy the optics of surveillance equipment (cameras, scopes) even if they also destroy eyes.

  • Airborne Laser Cannon (Score:5, Funny)

    by timotten ( 5411 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @07:14AM (#22772004) Homepage
    Man, if I had some popcorn for everytime some nutty defense department flunky suggested an airborne laser cannon, I would... have a whole lot of popcorn. I mean, a lot. I couldn't even fit it all in my house. It would be a lot.

  • Not previously talked about? (Score:3, Informative)

    by hazzey ( 679052 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @07:22AM (#22772056)
    And what about the tank-burning laser that can be fired from an airplane? Well, we haven't discussed that but I'm at a loss as to explain why.

    How about actually searching for something as simple as "laser"? This previous article appears on the first page:
    http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/13/0315230 [slashdot.org]

  • Has anyone told Sgt Bilko about this?
  • For next weeks news; China develops anti-satelite missiles with anti-laser skin.
  • I really don't understand the need to emphasize the part about the beam expander and turret. It's just a beam expander. The easiest way to build one is to simply use two converging lenses separated by a distance equal to the sum of their focal lengths. Heck. I even remembered assembling one as part of a "game" in one of my undergrad physics (majors') class. What I am more interested is in how they managed to created such a powerful beam, etc. (I didn't RTFA).

    Perhaps, this is the reason why I can't explain
    • From the article:

      [...] inside a retractable, swiveling pod called the turret [...]
      This makes it sound like most people don't know what a turret is. I mean, it's just a fairly ordinary gun turret. Except it fires a laser instead of machine gun rounds of course.

      Plus Firefox's spell-checker insists that it should be spelt "swivelling".

  • this won't work... (Score:4, Funny)

    by pointbeing ( 701902 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @08:28AM (#22772520)
    ...where are you gonna find a shark big enough to carry the thing?
    • Okay, it's hard enough to be evil with the shortage of sharks with laser beams on their heads, but requiring me to teach them how to fly is just too damn much.

      (Can I use ballistae, and just be a short range evil overlord?)
    • You merely need a Beowulf cluster of sharks with green laser pointers. You then paint the target with a sardine beam to get their attention.
    • This shark [wikipedia.org] may be big enough.
  • What would be funny is if they coated a tank (or at least the top of it) in the reflective stuff on traffic signs.

    The plane would shoot itself down..
  • New mirror surface tank deployed to defeat anti-tank laser system. One surprise found with the highly polished mirror surfaced tanks is that from a distance they looked like the surrounding surfaces. One unexpected side effect however is when a laser was fired at such a tank the beam was reflected hitting infantry in the area causing severe burns.

    Next story: kinetic energy weapon developed to take out mirrored surface tanks. They are like little anvils placed in low orbit. When called on they drop f
    • They are like little anvils placed in low orbit. When called on they drop from orbit onto the tanks at terminal velocity. A swarm of these weapons can take out a battalion of vehicles in just a few seconds.

      The CBU-97 [globalsecurity.org] is basically what you describe. Instead of being deployed in orbit, it is a cluster munition delivered by an aircraft. It is quite effective at taking out large groups of tanks without the pilot having to target an individual vehicle. The weapon is simply aimed at a cluster of tanks and e

  • Traumatic experiences (Score:3, Funny)

    by Gwyn_232 ( 585793 ) on Monday March 17, 2008 @10:37AM (#22773666)

    Pleo, from California start-up Ugobe, is a baby dinosaur robot that acts and learns like a real animal, remembering traumatic experiences and friendly owners. We peeled off its skin
    Gee, I wonder which category it uses to remember the PopSci editors?
  • Re burning a hole in a tank.

    it's unfortunate but it's trivially easy to do the math on this one:

    • Lasers are rather expensive (xx million) and inefficient, like 15%
    • White paint and/or titanium foil is very cheap (a million times cheaper) and very ( > 70%) efficient at reflecting incident energy.
    • Ablative material that can generate smoke when heated and block a laser beam is REALLY cheap. Like free, as in branches and sod.

    It makes absolutely no economic sense to use a xx million dollar laser of

    • The "Windex and Bounty" defense (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Not all parts of a tank are appropriate for your twigs, sod, tin foil and white paint defense. For example, what about the tracks (or tires for that matter)? Sooner or later, the laser would hit something that was important and not easily made shiny.

      I suppose the vehicles could travel underneath giant mirrors, but that would create a new set of problems. At that point, all you have to do is can cut off the enemy's supply of Windex and paper towels. Seriously, I think the reflective surfaces would have

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AJWM ( 19027 )
      It's not as simple as that. Lasers aren't like really powerful flashlights, there are qualitatively different effects when something is hit by an intense laser beam vs just being hit by an intense beam of incoherent light.

      Look up "laser supported detonation", for one example. And white paint or foil reflecting 70% of the energy doesn't help much if the other 30% burns/boils/detonates that layer in a fraction of a second.

      But tell you what, we'll let you build a wall out of branches and sod and then you sta

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Phrogman ( 80473 )
      Well 2 thoughts:

      * First off, your solutions would leave a battlefield covered with bright white tanks covered with a layer of dirt and branches on top. Presumably covering the sides with dirt won't work so well, and assuming that it means we have a host of highly visable targets (ie a bright white horizontal stripe) that can be shot using standard tank weapons :P

      * It doesn't really matter that the laser costs millions of time more than a specific defense. The tank can't shoot back at the aircraft attacking
  • Every time I see one of these fool "future weapons", like the Tank Destroying Laser, that solve battlefield problems that don't exist, my immediate thought is "what tard has his stars riding on this turkey?"

    Is this woo laser supposed to destroy materiel? And this beam thingy is better than a missile how? For that matter, it's better good-ol depleted uranium rounds how? Pfraf.

    Is it supposed to destroy people? If you want to destroy people you can't beat little jagged pieces of metal flying around at superson
  • It's easy for ground troops to defend their tanks against airborne laser cannons.

    Just shining a laser pointer at the pilot is apparently enough to cause the plane to crash.

  • And what about the tank-burning laser that can be fired from an airplane? Well, we haven't discussed that but I'm at a loss as to explain why.

    If everyone had tank-burning lasers what could CmdrTaco drive to work?
  • ... I wouldn't want to be the second person to try out the prototype.

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