HOW do you 鈥渃urve鈥� a laser beam without using mirrors?
The intensity of a laser beam is normally concentrated in a central region, but Pavel Polynkin at the University of Arizona, Tuscon, and colleagues have built a device that splits a straight laser pulse into certain constituent parts. They used this to create a beam with an intense region on its right-hand side and less intense regions on the left.
As such a pulse travels, energy flows between these regions and causes the beam to bend roughly 5 millimetres to the right over 60 centimetres. The team says such beams could be useful for guiding laser energy around small objects (Science, ).
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