Jump to content

Recommended Posts

Posted
That's just a description of what a laser IS... not what it DOES... and isn't very helpful unless you already understand what the words 'coherent'' date=' 'stimulated' and 'emission' mean in that context.

 

For someone whose sig. claims to rail against one theocracy, you seem to be content to keep science at the level of a religion where only a chosen few understand the 'secret words'... with yourself, of course, being one of the chosen few. :rolleyes:[/quote']

 

Yeah, because you can't possibly go out and educate yourself on these topics, because it's such a big secret.

 

[rant]To me, complaints like this ring hollow. One can claim to want knowledge, but if you aren't willing to go out and learn some basics, and then all you do is complain about how the advanced knowledge isn't accessible to you, and complain about how someone won't spoon-feed you information because you aren't willing to get off your ass and do any work yourself, it's hypocrisy. Your desire to learn is not sincere.[/rant]

  • Replies 72
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Posted
A significant number of lasers are not even monochromatic,

 

I apologise, then... I was under the impression you had labled a laser as emitting "coherent" light which, as I understood it, means...

 

"maintains a near-constant phase relationship"

 

... and it looked like you were contradicting yourself.

 

 

Swansont... re-read the entire thread, then re-read your own post... then come back with an intelligent thought.

 

 

x__heavenly__x... given the conditions, nothing happens to the light in the sphere. It'll just keep bouncing around inside the sphere until something changes the conditions... that could be as simple as 'opening' it... in which case almost all the 'stored' light will leave the sphere in less time than it would take for your brain to register the popping noise of you breaking the vacuum seal.

 

If you want to know 'how much' light you can 'fit' into the sphere, then you'll have to...

 

... work out how big a photon is (something I neither know or wish to know)...

 

... work out how closely you can 'pack photons together' before they affect each other...

 

... find a way to 'force feed light' into a fixed volume faster than than it can escape...

 

... credit me on a few of the huge number of papers you, and your descendants, could write on this subject over the course of the next few hundred years :D

Posted

Well, solar power is used and converted into electricity to power (among other things) light bulbs. Trapping large amounts of light in a sphere would cut out the middle man, so to speak.

 

If it was actually feasible, anyway...

Posted

So to know that we gotta expariment rite?....like to know the behavior of light or anything like this...

I think we can put as much light we want but the sphere will start to heat up in an exponential rate and we can see what happenes when high energy laser is used insted of plain light

:)

Posted
I apologise' date=' then... I was under the impression you had labled a laser as emitting "coherent" light which, as I understood it, means...

 

"maintains a near-constant phase relationship"

 

... and it looked like you were contradicting yourself.

[/quote']

no problem then :)

x__heavenly__x... given the conditions, nothing happens to the light in the sphere. It'll just keep bouncing around inside the sphere until something changes the conditions... that could be as simple as 'opening' it... in which case almost all the 'stored' light will leave the sphere in less time than it would take for your brain to register the popping noise of you breaking the vacuum seal.

as I pointed out, the light would just get absorbed by the material making up the sphere and the spehere would warm up slightly.

... work out how big a photon is (something I neither know or wish to know)...

you should want to know :P the important length of a photon is its wavelength. If a photon has a wavelength of 20cm, it isn't going to fit into a 5cm sphere.

... work out how closely you can 'pack photons together' before they affect each other...

photons do not interact with one another, so this isn't so much of a problem. The only force carrier that does interact with itself is the gluon. The biggest problem is interactions with the walls of the container, and the material inside the container (assuming there is any) which will begin to react in a nonlinear manner.

... find a way to 'force feed light' into a fixed volume faster than than it can escape...

it's called a laser ;)

... credit me on a few of the huge number of papers you, and your descendants, could write on this subject over the course of the next few hundred years :D

 

sadly it looks like it has all been done

Posted

Ahh... but 'given the conditions' means including the non-existant 'perfect reflective surface'... which I think everyone agrees doesn't/can't exist. This is just a way around losing any stored photons that interact with the surface material used in the sphere... iirc it's called Compton Scattering, but I could be wrong.

 

The sphere was originally 5 inches, or about 12 1/2 cm (1.25x10^-2 m)in diameter... and as the initial inquiry was about storing light, then the photons would be from the visible spectrum with wavelengths between 380 and 760 nm (3.8 to 7.6x10^-7 m)... easily large enough.

 

My saying the photons will bounce around forever isn't based on any experiment I could cite... but M31 "The Andromeda Galaxy" is the most distant visible object in the night sky, and that's over 2 million light years away... so photons from that source have been around longer that humans, so I figure any proof to contradict me won't happen until WAY after I'm too dead to care :lol:

Posted

se...reflected light may not get absorbed so fast by the surface...there may be some delay and in that delay the amount of photons stored in sphere may be increased...OR the whole sphere can be droped. Using a "closed-from-both-ends" optic cable with light alredy inside(we can find a way to do that) may do something?

Posted
Ahh... but 'given the conditions' means including the non-existant 'perfect reflective surface'... which I think everyone agrees doesn't/can't exist. This is just a way around losing any stored photons that interact with the surface material used in the sphere... iirc it's called Compton Scattering' date=' but I could be wrong.

[/quote']

 

Compton scattering happens with free electrons (must happen - free electrons can't absorb photons), or with bound electrons where the photon energy is much higher than the ionization energy (so the electron "looks" free to the photon) Visible light is much too low in energy - red light won't even ionize atoms.

Posted

at best you`ll be constructing a fast leakage photon capacitor on a macro scale, there are FAR MORE efficient ways to do this, and NON of them require lasers OR internaly mirrored spheres with a semi-permeable apature.

it`s basicly a waste of time :)

 

 

[edit] is "Mirrored" a word? LOL :))

Posted

A waste of time!?!? Pfffffffft...

 

I could collect light that reflected off famous people and sell it in spheres as a novelty item! :P

Posted

[edit] is "Mirrored" a word? LOL :))

 

Mirrored is a word.

The definition is : To reflect in or as if in a mirror ;)

Anyway I dont think anyone needs anything like a light resevoir right now.

Maybe in the future...

Posted
A waste of time!?!? Pfffffffft...

 

I could collect light that reflected off famous people and sell it in spheres as a novelty item! :P

LOL :)

cool idea, we could even market a flat version!, pehaps call it something like "Photon Graph" or something similar? ;))

Posted
A waste of time!?!? Pfffffffft...

 

I could collect light that reflected off famous people and sell it in spheres as a novelty item! :P

 

Or you could store that info in an emulsion or charge-coupled device, and print the likeness out on a sheet of paper. Nah, it'd never sell.

Posted

it will decay, as the lead will absorb the stray rays and nothing will become of it.

many isotopes are stored in lead recepticles for this reason :)

 

in a nutshell, nothing at all will happen to the isotope that wouldn`t happen in fresh air :)

Posted
it will decay' date=' as the lead will absorb the stray rays and nothing will become of it.

many isotopes are stored in lead recepticles for this reason :)

 

in a nutshell, nothing at all will happen to the isotope that wouldn`t happen in fresh air :)[/quote']

 

Not quite true. The rays will be absorbed by the lead, but this means that the lead nuclei will become excited, releasing radiation of its own (and hence making it warm). It's why we bury these containers a few miles underground under vast quantities of concrete.

Posted

I was thinking Lab stored isotopes in the lead pots :)

 

yes heat is a factor on a huge scale, I didn`t consider that, good point :)

Posted
Not quite true. The rays will be absorbed by the lead, but this means that the lead nuclei will become excited, releasing radiation of its own (and hence making it warm). It's why we bury these containers a few miles underground under vast quantities of concrete.

 

Chances are the gammas would ionize electrons rather than excite the nuclei, though the nucleus will recoil slightly when the atom is ionized. The electrons then cause secondary ionizations and emit Bremsstrahlung as they scatter, all the while any given electron has less and less energy. But you're right in that it all eventually shows up as an increase in temperature.

 

Plus, lead attenuates according to an exponential; you wouldn't shield all of the original radiation. Some would escape.

Posted

Hey, I only did A-level physics, can't get it all right ;)

 

I was thinking some of that as I posted it, but couldn't really be bothered changing it :)

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.