Scientists Using Diamonds to Make New Type of Laser

Phys.org reported that by harnessing diamonds to produce light beams that are wider, more powerful and have a wider range of colors than “the current Raman laser,” a team at Strathclyde is developing a new generation of lasers.

According to the news outlet, the team has achieved two key firsts:

•  The first ever “tunable” diamond Raman lasers, where the colour of the light can be adjusted to meet specific needs: for example, the treatment of vascular lesions – an abnormal cluster of blood vessels – requires a yellow/orange light that is difficult to produce with conventional lasers but which is needed to maximise absorption by the lesion while minimising damage to surrounding tissue. Underpinning this breakthrough is the fact that diamond’s optical properties enable diamond lasers to produce a range of colours that are hard to generate by conventional means. For example, yellow/orange light which can be used in medicine in the treatment of conditions such as vascular lesions, or retinal bleeding of blood vessels at the back of the eyes.
• The first ever continuously-operating diamond Raman laser. This is important because lasers that can only provide short pulses of light are unsuited to some medical and other applications – for example, where pulses would damage delicate structures in the eye. In medical treatment for highly sensitive areas, therefore, there are situations where using a pulsed laser would create too much acoustic disturbance.

Click here to read the full Phys.org report.