HERCULES laser beam sets record for intensity

“If you could hold a giant magnifying glass in space and focus all the sunlight shining toward Earth onto one grain of sand, that concentrated ray would approach the intensity of a new laser beam made in a University of Michigan laboratory.” [U-M]

That sounds pretty damn intense alright. The laser, dubbed HERCULES, takes up several rooms and contains 300 terawatts of power. To put that into perspective, think 300 times the capacity of the entire US power grid.

What does HERCULES do with all of that power? If focuses it into a 1.3 micron speck about 100th the diameter of a human hair, of course. Scientists believe that intense beams like this could help them develop better ways to treat cancer, among other applications.

HERCULES is a titanium-sapphire laser. Light fed into it bounces like a pinball off a series of mirrors and other optical elements. It gets stretched, energized, squeezed and focused along the way.

It all sounds pretty cool, but use is very limited for an uber-laser like this. We hope some good research comes out of it (and that nothing gets blown up of course).