A New Ultrafast Laser

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Marina W
11-8-18


Most modern ultrafast lasers emit pulses of light 300 million times a second. But in the age of new technology constantly being invented, a new ultrafast laser can now emit pulses of light 30 billion times per second, which is 100 times faster than the other lasers. How exactly does this work? Well, first understanding what an ultrafast laser is is important. An ultrafast laser emits short, rapidly fired pulses of light that usually last about tens of millionths of a billionth of a second. Scientists usually use a technique called mode locking, in which light waves bounce back and forth in a mirrored space in such a way that the waves build on each other and as a result produce rapid flashes of light.

But the new method used to create the new ultrafast laser uses a more forceful approach by cutting up a continuous laser beam into different pulses. Ultrafast lasers can typically produce something known as a frequency comb, which is light made up of individual colors. The evenly distributed hues, when plotted, look like the teeth on a comb. To make this work, scientists had to remove electronic “jitter” that would blur out the combs sharp teeth. This new approach is actually very useful for measuring the frequency of light precisely.

After this new invention, I would say the next steps are to figure out how to put this new method to its full potential. Scientists should figure out how to incorporate this new high tech laser into our daily lives while benefiting the human race. Some possible uses for this laser would be precisely observing stars and other planets outside our solar system and also a way to transmit information, in which bits of information could be stored in each separate color and then the beam could be sourced through a fiber-optic cable.


Electro-Optic Laser Pulses
Image result for laser beam






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