Ronn!Blankenship wrote:
One of my students asked a question in the middle of class last night that I had no answer for: in the standard red diode laser pointer that you can now buy for chump change just about anywhere, what is the element or compound which produces the light? E.g., in a ruby laser, it is the chromium atoms, and in a He-Ne gas laser the helium is used to pump the neon into the state where it will lase, so what is it in the el-cheapo diode laser, like the one I was using at the time to point to the figure being projected on the wall? Hydroxyl masers in protostars, now that's a subject I can at least make some intelligent comments about . . .http://www.repairfaq.org/sam/laserdps.htm#dpslp1
As far as I gathered it uses a diode set up where the output of the light depends directly on the battery capacity. Semi conductors/solid state physics or some such. It's been a long while since I've thought in those realms so I'm not in tune anymore and it all sounds very vaguely familiar but in a aha sort of way. For the life of me I really haven't got a clue anymore. My brain must be shrinking.
Sonja GCU: Internet, you gotta love it.
_______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
