Record Setting 500 Trillion-Watt Laser Shot Achieved

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Record Setting 500 Trillion-Watt Laser Shot Achieved

Posted by samzenpus on Monday July 16, 2012 @05:34AM from the not-in-the-eyes dept.

cylonlover writes "Researchers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's National Ignition Facility (NIF) have achieved a laser shot which boggles the mind: 192 beams delivered an excess of 500 trillion-watts (TW) of peak power and 1.85 megajoules (MJ) of ultraviolet laser light to a target of just two millimeters in diameter. To put those numbers into perspective, 500 TW is more than one thousand times the power that the entire United States uses at any instant in time."

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Or, to put it another way ... by jxander · 2012-07-16 05:39 · Score: 5, Funny

Enough energy to send a DeLorean back to 1985 over 400,000 times.

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now all you need is a spinning mirror... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-16 05:41 · Score: 5, Funny

...and you could vaporize a human target from space.
1. Re:now all you need is a spinning mirror... by Bill_the_Engineer · 2012-07-16 06:35 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  ...or pop a lot of popcorn.
  
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Re:To put that in perspective by NettiWelho · 2012-07-16 05:46 · Score: 5, Funny

... so, where did they get this amount of power? I hope they did not have to trickle load their capacitors for a whole year.
They plugged in a ZPM.
Re:Now all they have to do is put it on a shark! by durrr · 2012-07-16 05:59 · Score: 4, Funny

That's not funny.
Alderaan died that way.
Re:Fusion Ignition by Zak3056 · 2012-07-16 05:59 · Score: 4, Funny

One application of this type of engineering is to serve as an ignition swith for a fusion energy plant.
They should totally tell the guys at the National Ignition Facility about this. </sarcasm>

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Re:One Thousand Times by ackthpt · 2012-07-16 06:11 · Score: 4, Funny

"To put those numbers into perspective, 500 TW is more than one thousand times the power that the entire United States uses at any instant in time."
Except for the instant when the lasers were on, of course.
Meanwhile, we seek green energy, wind farms, etc. All this so some geeks can fire a laser and then party on about it.
and I wasn't even invited!

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Re:To put that in perspective by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-16 06:15 · Score: 5, Funny

correction: rubbing your hands together saying 'muahahaa'
Re:To put that in perspective by MyLongNickName · 2012-07-16 07:00 · Score: 4, Funny

You have no idea how hard I rub my hands together. Let's just say I've worked up some muscles for that very type of activity.

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Re:Now all they have to do is put it on a shark! by skegg · 2012-07-16 10:35 · Score: 4, Funny

Hmm, did you send it via Skype?