Huge problem: Malaria kills millions, but you can’t just spray DDT anymore to wipe out disease-carrying mosquitoes (DDT also wipes out, oh, majestic bald eagles). What do do? You could search for another toxin to spray. Or, if you’re 3ric Johanson at Intellectual Ventures Laboratory, you could invent a new gadget. A gadget that tracks […]
Here’s a cool project by Junichi Akita: it’s a modular LED display that you can draw on using a laser, then clear by tilting sideways.
You may remember Mike Gould and his awesome laser lunchboxes from his project article in MAKE Volume 20. Mike is at Maker Faire Detroit, talking about lunchbox lasers and performing laser shows as the Illuminatus Laser Light Opera. Check out his website for more information on building your own laser lunchbox. The rest of Mike’s […]
Release Party for Make:23 July 23rd, 6pm @ Ada’s Technical Books, Seattle, WA The newest issue of MAKE Magazine (Vol 23) features Seattle’s 3ric Johanson on the cover with a new weapon in the war on malaria: the Photonic Fence from Intellectual Ventures. Informally, it’s a laser-powered mosquito zapper. 3ric, who also opened Hackerbot Labs […]
My friend Jon Singer has been experimenting with creating a relatively-cheap, straightforward flashlamp-pumped dye laser. This first-blush version uses caps he bought on eBay. As he refines the design, he hopes to avoid as many commercial components as possible. This proof-of-concept build was attempting to answer the musical question: Is a dozen Joules enough to […]
University of Rochester Associate Processor Chunlei Guo has developed a technique that uses a femtosecond laser to blast nanoscale features into the surface of a piece of metal–pretty much any metal. These tiny features interact selectively with white light to reflect a particular color–pretty much any color. It’s also possible to achieve a near-perfect black finish and iridescence. If the process can be made economical (it’s very slow at present, requiring about half an hour to treat a dime-sized area), it could be a complete game-changer when it comes to finishing metals. Guo gives the example of a bicycle factory that could use only a single laser to make parts of any color or color scheme.
My Dorkbot DC cohort Jon Singer sent me a link to a webpage of a buddy of his, a Croatian laser-hacker, who grew his own KDP (Monopotassium phosphate) crystals for use in a Nd:YAG laser. He had a time getting the crystals to grow, but was able to finally get some suitable growth and to […]
