How does ammonia maser work?
How does ammonia maser work?
maser used a beam of ammonia molecules that passed along the axis of a cylindrical cage of metal rods, with alternate rods having positive and negative electric charge. The nonuniform electric field from the rods sorted out the excited from the unexcited molecules, focusing the excited molecules through a small…
How do masers work?
A maser oscillator requires a source of excited atoms or molecules and a resonator to store their radiation. The excitation must force more atoms or molecules into the upper energy level than in the lower, in order for amplification by stimulated emission to predominate over absorption.
What is the difference between a laser and a maser?
What is difference between laser and maser? The LASER, or Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation, uses light in the visible frequency (light that humans can see). A MASER uses light in the microwave frequency (light waves we cannot see).
Why do lasers require more energy than masers?
The electrons in masers are hit by some form of electromagnetic waves, which excite the electrons to a higher energy level, and when the electrons move down to a lower energy level, they emit a photon with a longer wavelength and lower frequency (less energy) than a laser.
Can masers be weapons?
A maser was a type of energy weapon, similar to but distinct from a laser. Masers used kinetic energy as well as laser energy to damage a target.
Can you make a microwave laser?
Modern masers can be designed to generate electromagnetic waves at not only microwave frequencies but also radio and infrared frequencies.
How does a hydrogen maser work?
A hydrogen maser works by sending hydrogen gas through a magnetic gate that allows only atoms in certain energy states to pass through. The atoms that make it through the gate enter a storage bulb surrounded by a tuned, resonant cavity.
Why do lasers need a mirror?
Placing mirrors at opposite ends of a laser cavity enables the beam to travel back and forth, which results in increased amplification due to the longer path length through the medium.
How is a maser created?
The maser is based on the principle of stimulated emission proposed by Albert Einstein in 1917. When atoms have been induced into an excited energy state, they can amplify radiation at a frequency particular to the element or molecule used as the masing medium (similar to what occurs in the lasing medium in a laser).
Is maser more powerful than laser?
Maser bolts carried much more momentum behind them than lasers, to the point that deflecting such a bolt might cause a lightsaber user to lose their grip on their weapon.
Are gamma lasers possible?
A gamma-ray laser, or graser, is a hypothetical device that would produce coherent gamma rays, just as an ordinary laser produces coherent rays of visible light. In his 2003 Nobel lecture, Vitaly Ginzburg cited the gamma-ray laser as one of the 30 most important problems in physics.
How far can a microwave weapon reach?
When targeted towards humans, microwave weapons enable atoms to vibrate, which produces heat and as a result body temperature rises from 98.6° F to 107° F at a distance of 200 yards. This temperature rise can be lethal at a closer range, which can potentially stun a person due to peripheral nerve stimulation.
What is the resonant frequency of hydrogen?
Hydrogen Maser Masers operate at the resonance frequency of the hydrogen atom, which is 1,420,405,752 Hz.
Can a laser melt a mirror?
Q: if you get a powerful enough laser, can it burn through a mirror, or will it always be reflected? A: In principle you can burn through any mirror if the laser is strong enough.
Do mirrors make lasers stronger?
Dr. Martin Austwick from University College London explains how the use of mirrors further amplifies this signal in lasers. Martin – Now a way that you can make the amplification even more powerful is by having parallel mirrors.
Can a maser be used as a weapon?
Which laser has the highest frequency?
The wikipedia page for gamma-ray lasers certainly makes them sound like a difficult research project, not something in production. The graphic they have for commercial lasers by frequency seems to imply the highest-freq commercially available laser is pretty solidly ultraviolet.
Can microwave weapons go through walls?
Microwaves travel through unshielded materials like walls, but can only travel by line of sight. Any weapon or other source of the waves would have to be located on a direct line with the embassy or its housing units, precise enough to target specific people rather than blanket the entire embassy.
What is an ammonia maser?
The ammonia maser is a device for generating electromagnetic waves, whose operation is based on the properties of the ammonia molecule which we discussed briefly in the last chapter. We begin by summarizing what we found there.
What happens when ammonia is disturbed at a frequency?
If the ammonia molecule is in either of the two states of definite energy and we disturb it at a frequency ω such that ℏω = EI − EII = 2A, the system may make a transition from one state to the other. Or, if it is in the upper state, it may change to the lower state and emit a photon.
Why does ammonia have a high polarizability?
Many molecules have an energy in an electric field which is proportional to E2. The coefficient is the polarizability of the molecule. Ammonia has an unusually high polarizability because of the small value of A in the denominator.
How does a maser oscillation work?
Maser oscillations rely on the stimulated emission between two hyperfine energy levels of atomic hydrogen. Here is a brief description of how they work: First, a beam of atomic hydrogen is produced. This is done by submitting the gas at low pressure to a high-frequency radio wave discharge (see the picture on this page).