Scientists from six universities across the country, including the University of Nevada, Reno, are taking part in a project to measure some of the world’s most powerful lasers.
It’s called Diagnostics for Extreme Light, otherwise known as DELIGHT. And recently, researchers got a boost through a $4.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation.
Their work doesn’t involve building the lasers. Rather, they measure light, particles, and matter created from the beams.
Back in May, the group spent four weeks in Ann Arbor with their fellow researchers, studying the country’s highest-intensity laser set up at the University of Michigan.
“If you imagine a laser point that you might use at home, imagine a billion, billion laser pointers all focused at one place, and then you turn them all on for just a billionth of a second. That’s what we’re talking about here,” said Tom White, Physics Department Chair at UNR.
White said there aren’t necessarily real-world applications to their studies as of now, but they give scientists the chance to explore the Milky Way from a unique lens here on Earth.
“You can generate extreme conditions that aren’t found anywhere else on the planet. So, you can use these lasers to create conditions that you might find at the center of planets,” White said.
Looking back on their month in Michigan, third-year PhD student Brittany Callin said she got to deep dive into any issue that came up.
“I was really able to think about it, spend a lot of time actually dealing with like experimental challenges that we might experience… I was just surprised by how long it takes to do something that even seems simple on paper… You’re like, it’s going to take like 10 minutes. And really, three days later, you’re still working on the same thing,” said Callin.