12 Jan 23
The SF-lovers here will have encountered the tractor beam, which manipulates even large objects in space.
Now some researchers succeeded in applying a force on a torison pednulum using laser light.
https://phys.org/news/2023-01-optical-tractor-macroscopic.html
for thsoe able to go beyond the payway:
https://opg.optica.org/oe/fulltext.cfm?uri=oe-31-2-2665&id=525052
15 Jan 23
@Ponderable
I don't know how sci fi that is since we all know photons impart kinetic energy to whatever they hit but this idea of lasers as tractor beams have been around for a while.
16 Jan 23
@sonhouse saidYes, it is a quantitative step not a qualitative one.
@Ponderable
I don't know how sci fi that is since we all know photons impart kinetic energy to whatever they hit but this idea of lasers as tractor beams have been around for a while.