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Lasers for Fun and Profit
Stuart of Wapping writes "This is a very interesting site, links to pages describing real-life, tried-and-tested Star-Trek/James Bond gadgets... The Laser Medical Pen, or Medpen, developed in-house by the Laser Division of the Air Force Research Laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate, is a second-generation device that provides a physician or paramedic with a unique, compact, portable, and battery-operated laser capability. The laser can cut like a scalpel as well as coagulate bleeding."
I remember Scott Adams mentioning something like this in "The Dilbert Future", and why it wouldn't go mainstream, because people would buy them from medical supply stores. And then just imagine them in the hands of your friends. Go to sleep and have your asscrack sealed.
Only in slashdot are posts of solidarity modded at -1 Redundant, while posts of antagonism are modded as -1 Flamebait.
Wow, I thought laser pointers in traffic were bad.
This'll bring it to a whole new level.
This is just another example of how real life follows in the footsteps of science fiction: impossible things 30 years ago being made possible in similar ways that they were 'being done' in sci-fi stuffs. It never ceases to amaze me how writers with far-fetched ideas can be on the money so often, even though they are way ahead of their time.
What intrigued me was the information about high power microwaves. It says
"High Power Microwave produces burnout and disruption in electronics while not affecting humans."
Yes, I realize that anything within a range of the spectrum around 2.4Ghz is considered microwave (cell phone, cordless phones, 802.11, etc.) but isn't the only reason they don't hurt people because they are relatively low power? I imagine if you pump enough power into one of those things it could start to make you boil.
Anyway, I'd hate to be one of the test subjects used in determining whether or not this actually does cause damage.
The future isn't what it used to be.
I used to work at a laser lab and we had a suitcase laser. Looked like a photographers case, brushed aluminum, plug it in, and out from the corner came a beam of Alexandrite produced photons (Alexandrite is a vibronic and can be tuned to lase at many different frequencies). This suitcase was shopped around the military quite a bit, that same lab used to buy meat from the grocery store and cut it with the lasers to test surgical properties. Most dangerous place I ever worked, coding with green goggles on, possible instant blindness, 20kv shocks whilst standing in water from leaking cooling pumps! I even got my belt burned like a high school ticker tape experiment, an ND (neutral density) filter exploded because the energy from the beam was so powerful, my boss knocked the hamamatsu(sp?) energy meter out of the way, and I was behind it at belt level, two burns close together in the leather belt and one further away as I tried to escape :)
Hedley
Microwave is generally everying above 1Ghz up to near visible light.
Microwave ovens operate at around 2.4Ghz usually... the reason they can heat up water is due to the frequency itself, and it's ability to cause water molecules to move around in the field. It's not, as some say, because it's the resonant frequency of a water molecule.
Microwave at higher frequencies could even be harmless.. depending.. the reason it screws up electronics is because of the photoelectric effect.. the microwaves end up creating lots of electric currents that burn out the equipment.
It's quite concievable that this would work yet be generally harmless to a human.
Air Force Research Laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate
I believe that is under the Department of Redundancy Department.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
Household chemicals? Ooo... so if I mix some ammonia, iodized salt, water, and ketchup, I'll have one of these? I bet my neighbors will quit making noise at 3 in the morning when they know I've got this!
Please consider making an automatic monthly recurring donation to the EFF
Allow me to quote someone from this very site:
--start--
Hit in the ass by a laser
Livin' it up when I'm goin' down
Hit in the ass by a laser
Lovin' it up 'til I hit the ground
-Wadetemp
---end---
[o]_O
Do you mean it cauterizes the wound? That is when intense heat stops bleeding. Coagulation is when the platelets aggregate to form clots. I doubt the laser is doing this.
First page of the instruction manual that comes with a laser:
CAUTION: DO NOT LOOK INTO LASER WITH REMAINING EYE!
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
All that money. All that research. All those lasers.
And yet the one thing I ask for is still missing. That's right. I want some sharks with frickin lasers attached to their heads.
Throw me a bone here, people.
Laser Medical Pen is 12 inches long, less than 1-inch in diameter, and weighs a mere pound.
When confronted with the rumors of an Active Denial Technology being developed; government officials claimed that this was only a rumor. They also said that the government do not intend to pursue such a technology. Other sources within DARPA and the Department of Defence says that this is not true and that several government institutions are actively using it today.
Look a monkey!
Everyone should have a Death Ray.
Especially a battery operated, portable Death Ray!
I just picked up a 3 Watt laser diode at a Hamfest recently. It's whats at the core of the med-pack and portable med-pens displayed. This thing is really fucking cool. It will make paper and wire insulation, plastic, etc. burst into flame from about 1/4 inch away.
The diode is made by Spectra Diode Labs (SDL) and channels 3 Watts of optical energy at 808 nanometers into a fiber optic. I have that clamped into a standard mechanical pencil to hold the fiber and allow it to be directed with some control.
The spot that appears is very scary because it appears weak red, about 5 mW of visible light energy is present but 98 % of the optical power is invisible in the infrared spectrum.
I haven't tried any home laser surgery yet, but it makes a dandy wire stripper or marking scribe. I also use it to open sealed ni-cad battery packs and change cells for walkie-talkies, etc.
Yep, Everyone should have a Death Ray!
-- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
They give off nasty gasses when they operate, HELLO EPA and if one of those planes that carries them crashes there is a 2 mile radius kill zone from the chemicals. Yea, it doesn't tell you that on the website.
The laser pen is cool though.
Is it just me or does this laser laser resemble something out of Real Genius? Now all we need is a giant Jiffy-Pop package and a mean ol' professor...
There is no spork.
Bury this post and watch to see if my prediction comes true....
taken! (by Davidleeroth) Thanks Bingo Foo!
You people are just not doing your jobs and will have to be fragged.
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
Actually I think most of the things we have today are because of the ideas in books/movies/etc. Not becuase some writer "predicted" it but because some reader thought "man it would be cool to have one of those communicator thingys" and so he made one. I doubt most writers are ahead of thier time but they have damn good ideas which us ubergeeks latch on to and make a reality. Mark my words, one day some geek will beat his brains out until warp engines are cruising ships around the galaxy not because Gene Roddenberry had some kinda vision of the future but because his idea seemed like it made some sense and sparked the brain of a few fans.
They should have the rest of the manual in braille for those who don't heed the caution.
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
I imagine a laser scapel will make short work of your underwear :-p
A lot of things that the general public first saw in sci-fi stories were already being discussed in the scientific community. The science fiction writers were often in contact with scientists (as friends, sometimes coworkers and in other relationships), and were inspired by what the scientists were already discussing.
That's the Directed Energy Directorate. Undirected energy R&D is handled by the Energetic Materials Branch of the Air Force Research Laboratory, which develops conventional bombs.
To trade is human, to hedge, divine!
And ya know what, they aren't doing that already. One more thing to slow us down. And just how do you see a laser scalpel from a normal metal ball-point pen on the X-ray?
While the concept sounds cool this isn't really useful in the field for emergency care. Disposable electrical cauteries that do exactly the same thing have been around for years. Very rarely does someone die from external bleeding that could be cauterized. Those types of wounds can usually be controlled easily with direct pressure, pressure points, etc. What kills people is pulmonary injuries, internal bleeding and/or neurological injuries. If you get shot or stabbed, closing the entrance/exit wounds with cauterization does very little for you. All the serious damage is on the inside and the only answer is being taken to the O.R. This is particually true of gun shot wounds as the shockwave around the bullet cavitates the tissue around its path through the body doing massive damage, of course relative to the size and more so velocity KE=1/2 m * v^2.
STOP ROCK VIDEO
How many of you have read the "reports" regarding supposed cattle mutilations coupled with UFOs, and how the incisions/cuts on the carcesses seem to be made with surgical precision, but no loss of blood at the incision (ie, the cuts seem to have been cauterized)?
I know there is at least one account I have read of that described the "aliens" seen using a laser like device, about one foot long...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon