Thursday, September 27, 2007

Is there a light 10 billion times brighter than the sun?

This article, by Jacob Silverman, talks about the Diamond synchrotron, which is a particle accelerator that can produce a beam of light 10 billion times brighter than the sun. A particle accelerator accelerates electrons to a great speed so that they'll produce a lot of energy, and the Diamond synchrotron concentrates these energetic electrons into an extremely concentrated beam of light. Since light waves consist of X-rays, this technology can be used to read manuscripts that are too old and fragile to handle. Since light waves also include waves such as microwaves, it could be possible to use this kind of technology to power homes, like nuclear energy (which uses nuclear fission reactors). When Silverman wrote this article, though, he failed to write possible harm this Diamond synchrotron could cause. Light from the sun includes UV rays, which are radioactive, and can cause cancer. If this synchrotron can produce a light beam 10 billion times as intense as the sun, this means it is also 10 billion times as radioactive as the sun. This light beam can be very beneficial, but it may also be very dangerous, so it needs safety precautions, just as nuclear reactors do, to insure safety while providing benefit.
http://science.howstuffworks.com/synchrotron.htm

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