Record-setting Laser May Aid Searches for Earthlike Planets

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Experimental data from a NIST gap-toothed frequency comb that are false colored to indicate the range from low power (red) to high power (blue). The comb is specially designed for astronomy. Each tooth is a precisely known frequency and the teeth are ...
Experimental data from a NIST "gap-toothed" frequency comb that are false colored to indicate the range from low power (red) to high power (blue). The comb is specially designed for astronomy. Each "tooth" is a precisely known frequency, and the teeth are widely separated (by 20 gigahertz) in comparison to a standard comb. Credit: M. Kirchner & S. Diddams/NIST

Scientists at the University of Konstanz in Germany and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have demonstrated an ultrafast laser that offers a record combination of high speed, short pulses and high average power. The same NIST group also has shown that this type of laser, when used as a frequency comb—an ultraprecise technique for measuring different colors of light—could boost the sensitivity of astronomical tools searching for other Earthlike planets as much as 100 fold.


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