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LasersLasers are tools that emit concentrated beams of visible light by stimulating electrons into emitting photons. The term is an acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation. Lasers are designed to emit light of a single color in one direction, rather than the spectrum of colors emitted in all directions by a light bulb, star, or other source. This is accomplished through two competing effects. First, electrons are continuously energized within a material's atoms to a relatively stable energy level. Then, these energized electrons are induced to release their energy by emitting photons. These light particles result in a continuous chain reaction of emitted light for as long as electrons continue to be energized. Lasers can be made from crystals, gases, fiber optics, and other materials with unique stable energy levels, producing various colors and beam durations. Their uniformity and precision have made them invaluable tools for surgical procedures, treatment of dermatological and dental problems, and industrial manufacturing processes.Explore Lasers

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Lasers have been used to create natural adhesives for paperGerman researchers at four Fraunhofer institutes have developed a method to seal paper packaging using a carbon monoxide laser. Without the need for glue or plastic adhesives, the Papure project is expected to improve the recyclability of paper. (Some readers may experience a paywall.) The Verge Scientists have diverted the path of lightning using lasersA proof of concept for a laser protection system, which could be used to protect launchpads and airports in the future, was conducted on the Säntis mountain in northeastern Switzerland. Rapid laser pulses heated air molecules, creating a more conductive, 50-meter (164-foot) path for the electrical discharge to travel through. Smithsonian Magazine Random lasers can be created from biomaterials, such as peanuts and birch leavesRather than creating a narrow beam of light via amplification in an optical cavity, the random laser produces a red glow by scattering photons created in the natural pores of a peanut kernel after it has been injected with a solution of light-generating carbon dots derived from birch leaves. ZME Science Removal of different color tattoo inks may require multiple lasersLight needs to be absorbed by ink particles to break them down into small enough pieces for the immune system to eliminate. Color ink reflects, rather than absorbs, lasers of the same color, while black ink absorbs all colored lasers. Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell Electron accelerators are used to create X-ray lasersIn an X-ray free-electron laser, electromagnetic fields are used to accelerate and move electrons in wiggling patterns, causing them to emit synchronized, high-energy X-rays. This resulting light beam can strike targets up to 120 times per second to create movies of changing molecular structures and phenomena. SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory Lasers help build the layers of circuit components in microchipsDuring the photolithography process, light is projected through a blueprint onto a light-sensitive chemical layer on silicon wafers, etching patterns that become transistors through a series of successive reactions. These processes require significant electricity, as only about 2% of photons reach the wafer. Engadget Fiber lasers used for metal engravings can’t burn your skinThese devices use diodes and mirrors to create pulses of light that vaporize metal in billionths of a second, though at wavelengths that cannot react with organic material. Pulse width, power, and speed adjustments can produce white, black, and even colored patterns through controlled heat reactions. WIRED Space probes propelled by lasers may one day visit distant planetary systemsLaunched in 2016, Breakthrough Starshot is a project to send gram-sized spacecraft to the nearest stars and their planets at 10% to 20% the speed of light after being accelerated by ground-based laser systems. The project requires orders of magnitude advancements to current technology. The Economist Gravitational waves are detected at LIGO by measuring shifts in interfering lasersThe instruments at each site send lasers down equally long arms, which should take the same amount of time to travel between suspended mirrors. Passing gravitational waves alter the shape of space—lengthening one arm and shrinking the other—altering how long it takes the lasers to complete their path, which scientists can measure. Veritasium Lasers are classified based on their gain medium and mode of emissionAll lasers possess a material whose atoms must be energized by a power source, such as electricity or chemical reactions. Different media will produce different colors of light through a cascade of emissions resulting from an initial stimulated emission. Laserax Stimulating electrons to emit identical photons produces lasersThis effect was predicted by Albert Einstein in 1917, and requires all excited electrons in a material to exist in the same excited metastable state within their atoms. Pumping all atoms through the same mechanism, such as electricity or flash lamps, can create this environment. National Ignition Facility Lasers, semiconductors, medical imaging, and atomic clocks rely on quantum mechanicsSemiconductors, crucial in electronics, operate based on quantum superposition. Lasers use stimulated emission, a quantum process, and MRI machines leverage the quantum spin of hydrogen atoms for imaging. Atomic clocks measure time with unprecedented precision using quantum transitions. Caltech Science Exchange Scientists have proposed using lasers to push space trash into Earth's atmosphereSuch projects would allow most debris to burn up and no longer pose a risk to active satellites, telescopes, and astronauts on space stations. Enacting these plans would require substantial investments from private and governmental space agencies and overcoming international laws that prevent the removal of another country's space equipment. 1440 Lasers could be the most cost-effective tool for clearing dangerous space debrisA NASA study found that lasers from ground- and space-based systems could utilize the momentum of light to safely push smaller debris out of their orbits. These systems would need to be accompanied by amendments to international space law, which prevents any nation from touching debris from another country, among other strategies. Vox How lasers have become a go-to in archaeologyArchaeological teams now have another item to pack with their trowels: Lasers. Researchers' approach to unsurveyed land has been transformed by light detection and ranging technology. LiDAR has helped archaeologists break new ground and uncover... National Geographic How to cook food with lasersCreative Machines Lab at Columbia Engineering have developed a system of software-controlled lasers to cook food with precision, retain moisture with the final-cooked product, brown food within its original packaging, and create an entirely new meal creation process for a consumer. Watch this three-minute video to see for yourself. YouTube A breakdown of Earth's atmospheric layers, including why it can get colder or hotter with altitudeGases in the troposphere—the atmosphere's lowest layer—cool with increasing height as they get farther from the thermal energy emitted by Earth's warm surface. In the next layer—the stratosphere—ozone is increasingly heated by the sun's ultraviolet radiation with height. Because cooler air sinks and hotter air rises, the cooler troposphere and hotter stratosphere form a natural boundary keeping Earth's weather in the lowest layer. StarTalk Scientific applications of bubbles include logic gates, laser production, and medical imagingMicrobubbles of nonreactive gas can be administered to improve the reflection of sound waves and the resulting imaging during an ultrasound. Bouncing light waves within a bubble can stimulate emission of light from a trapped chemical, just as occurs within a laser, and bubbles can act as valves that control the flow and reaction rates in microfluidic systems. SciShow Explore the "winners and losers" of the Trump administration's H-1B visa feeIn this episode, experts discuss the rationale behind the new $100K fee, citing concerns about abuse of the H-1B program. Some economists warn that it could spur offshoring, reduce innovation, and create ripple effects on wages and talent supply. CNBC The construction of LIGO needed to compensate for Earth's curvatureAcross the 4-kilometer (2.5-mile) arms, the height of Earth's surface falls by almost a meter, preventing the lasers traveling within the arms from meeting the mirror at the end of each. Concrete slabs built beneath the arms help keep them level and provide structural support against seismic vibrations. LIGO Lab | Caltech The European Space Agency is building a space-based gravitational wave observatoryThe Laser Interferometer Space Antenna will consist of three spacecraft forming an equilateral triangle that will trail Earth as it orbits the sun. Lasers will travel 2.5 million kilometers along the sides of the triangle between these spacecraft to detect massive objects undergoing mergers or inspiraling, as well as speculative phenomena (e.g., cosmic strings). Scott Manley Several birthstones play key roles across modern technologiesDiamonds are used in drills and quantum computing, while peridot and zircon help in steelmaking and carbon capture. Rubies, sapphires, and alexandrite enable several varieties of lasers found in medicine and advanced optics. Garnets are found in water filtration systems and radiation detectors. Sapphires are used as substrates in semiconductors. SciShow Microchip fabricators create light by heating tin droplets to over 220,000 KelvinEvery second, lasers strike 50,000 droplets moving at 250 kilometers (155 miles) per hour, vaporizing the tin in supernova-like miniature explosions that produce ultraviolet light. Knowing this light will spread via diffraction as it passes through a filter during manufacturing, designers reverse-engineer the filter design based on the required final microchip pattern. Veritasium Solar sails use light as a means of propulsionPhotons possess momentum and can transfer it to objects they strike or bounce off, imparting radiative pressure, or a light-based force over a small surface area. Lasers fired at observational equipment with specially designed sails can theoretically use this mechanism to accelerate up to 20% the speed of light. Bloomberg Originals Watch Apple Watch cases be 3D printed from titanium powderApple Watch Ultra 3 cases are 3D printed entirely from recycled, aerospace-grade titanium powder using lasers to fuse particles. Over 400 metric tons of raw titanium were saved in 2025, with two watches fabricated from the same amount of raw material that would have previously been used to make one. Apple The first 3D printing patent was filed in 1967Wyn Swainson, an English literature graduate student, filed a patent in Denmark for a system that scans an object and uses the scanning data to rebuild it using lasers that harden light-sensitive plastic. However, he never developed a working prototype. The idea originated from wanting to produce recreations of sculptures. Guinness World Records As of 2023, the world's smallest particle accelerator is smaller than a pennyThe prototype is an example of a photonic accelerator, which utilizes tiny lasers to accelerate electrons rather than relying on oscillating electromagnetic fields to move them. It can deliver about 1 electron per second with energies equivalent to those found in cathode-ray tube televisions. Popular Science Glass can be endlessly recycled without losing qualitySand from specialized mines is thoroughly cleaned and melted at more than 1,600 degrees Celsius before being poured onto liquid tin and evenly spread out to form glass sheets. Some factories are designed to reprocess 100% of glass scraps created when cutting glass with diamond-tipped blades or lasers. The Factoran Pigments in paint can come from rocks, plants, insects or synthetic sourcesPaint's composition is varied through the combination of pigments with binding agents. In the past, artists created their own paints by mixing pigments with water, oils or egg yolks to bind the colors together. The Conversation The scarecrow isn't an effective tool for farms, but it is a potent symbol in horrorScarecrows are no longer the best way for farmers to prevent birds from messing with their crops, but the humanlike figures are still found in horror movies. Folklorists say that's because they recall an agrarian past that makes modern viewers uneasy. Popular Science Some materials can absorb low-energy light and emit high-energy radiationThrough anti-Stokes cooling, incoming energy is combined with vibrations in a material's crystal lattice to produce a net reduction in its temperature. Using this effect, lasers can be directed at microchip hot spots to help keep data centers cool. IEEE Spectrum Laser skin treatments can promote the production of collagenSkin resurfacing vaporizes the top layer of skin to reveal healthier, new skin, while collagen can give the skin structure and elasticity. Such procedures treat scars and burns, but may leave light spots on the skin. Johns Hopkins Medicine Optical clocks track time by measuring electron transitions involving visible lightThe frequency of visible light is significantly greater than that of microwaves used in cesium atomic clocks. This makes optical clocks about 100 times more accurate, losing at most one second across the entire age of the universe. NIST Laser-etched electric charges guide toner during laser printingWhen sending a print job, the file data generates an image that a laser maps positively charged regions onto a drum separately for each color toner. Once the negatively charged toner is applied where it was electrically attracted, heat and pressure fuse it onto the paper. HP The 2018 Nobel Prize in physics was awarded for creating tweezers out of lightAt 96, Arthur Ashkin became the oldest person to win a Nobel Prize in Physics for demonstrating how lasers can hold and measure objects, a technique that has since been used to explore microbiological environments. The award was also given to Gérard Mourou and Donna Strickland for developing a method of creating optical pulses. Sixty Symbols Light can be used to slow the motion of atomsWhile photons possess energy, they also have momentum, which allows them to collide with other particles, much like billiard balls, thereby slowing them down and reducing their kinetic energy, or temperature. Using multiple lasers from different directions, particles can be cooled to within one degree of absolute zero. Physics Girl Laser disc technology stores binary data in etched pits and landsThe pits are dips in the LaserDisc, CD, DVD, or Blu-ray surface that do not reflect the laser from the optical drive back to the photoelectric cell, resulting in a coded zero. Lands are reflective plateaus on the surface that code for a one. Into the Ordinary During LASIK surgery, a laser removes microscopic amounts of tissue from the corneaBefore surgery, a patient’s vision needs are incorporated with measurements and mapping of their eye’s surface to identify corrections to refractive errors. This ensures light entering the eye correctly focuses onto the retina to produce a clear image. LASIK Laser technology powers communication, medical and manufacturing toolsLasers are used when scanning groceries, printing documents or undergoing cosmetic procedures to enhance efficiency, precision and accuracy. Missile defense, targeting and optical communication systems have made using laser technology habitual in the military. NoIR InSight Photons emitted via stimulated emission have identical characteristicsWhen confined to a pair of mirrors, a single photon passing a region of population-inverted atoms can produce a chain reaction of monochromatic light. This chain reaction amplifies the initial photon, from which lasers get their name: light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation. minutephysics Credit for inventing the laser was fought over for nearly three decadesAlthough Theodore Maiman built the first working laser in 1960, Gordon Gould coined the term earlier. Charles Townes and Arthur Schawlow of Bell Labs filed a patent after Gould came up with the idea and name, but before Gould filed his patent. American Institute of Physics NASA uses a specialized plasma wind tunnel to test heat shield technologyThe ArcJet Complex ionizes compressed air that fires onto shields at hypersonic speeds, replicating the conditions of high-speed, planetary reentry. An enhanced facility incorporates lasers to mimic the radiant heating experienced during high-energy atmospheric traversal. Scott Manley Layers in sediment cores hold clues to Earth’s past climateBy analyzing materials such as pollen and algae within the layers of these cores, which are collected from lakes and oceans, scientists can learn what the environment and climate were like when that layer formed. USGS Quantum mechanics explains how particles behave like both matter and wavesIn the quantum world, particles such as electrons are “quantized,” meaning they can only hold specific values of energy or momentum. These particles also behave like waves, with their wave function predicting where they might be found at any moment as probability clouds called orbitals. US Department of Energy View a diagram of Earth's atmosphere, which is composed of five layersStarting from the surface, the troposphere is home to Earth's weather, followed by the stratosphere, which houses the ozone layer, and the mesosphere, which burns up most debris from space. Above these layers lies the thermosphere, where auroras are produced, and the exosphere, which lacks a clear outer boundary as it fades into outer space. UCAR Center for Science Education By 2028, a space trash-avoiding maneuver is expected to occur every 18 secondsAs the number of active Starlink satellites increases, greater efforts will be required to keep low Earth orbit free of debris, sparking a new technological space race. NASA has found that using lasers to manage small and medium debris could save up to $9B over 30 years. Morning Brew A laser energy system has allowed scientists to achieve fusion ignitionIn 2022, scientists used lasers to create a powerful implosion that bound hydrogen isotopes together, releasing more energy than was input into the system. Research is ongoing to achieve this self-sustaining reaction with larger yields and energy gains. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Quantum computers harness weird physics to explore unsolvable problemsClassical computers manipulate bits as either 0 or 1, but quantum computers use qubits to hold combinations of both, enabling new algorithms. This new approach could one day help with breakthroughs in medicine, chemistry, and AI. WIRED Blockchain can be explained in five layers of difficultyBlockchain, the key technology behind bitcoin, is a new network that helps decentralize trade and allows for more peer-to-peer transactions. Wired challenged political scientist and blockchain researcher Bettina Warburg to explain blockchain technology to five different people: a child, a teen, a college student, a grad student, and an expert. WIRED Examine different layers of a brain scanWhat advanced imaging can tell us about the human brain The Franklin Institute

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