Star Trek 'Tractor Beam' Created By Scientists

[Judi Lynn]

Star Trek 'Tractor Beam' Created By Scientists

Researchers re-create the "tractor beam" made famous by the popular US science fiction show Star Trek.

1:11am UK, Friday 25 January 2013

A team of scientists has created a real-life miniature "tractor beam" - as featured in the Star Trek series - in a development which may lead to more efficient medical testing.

The microscopic beam - created by scientists from Scotland and the Czech Republic - allows a source of light to attract objects.

Light manipulation techniques have existed since the 1970s, but researchers say the experiment is the first instance of a beam being used to draw objects towards light.

Researchers from the University of St Andrews and the Institute of Scientific Instruments (ISI) in the Czech Republic say development of the beam may be an aid to medical testing, such as in the examination of blood samples.

More:
http://news.sky.com/story/1042456/star-trek-tractor-beam-created-by-scientists

[Riftaxe]

1. Here is a similiar article from 2010

Working Tractor Beam Can Move Objects 5 Feet With Just Light

[bayareamike]

2. But doze are dem SOCIALIST countriez!!!!

I thought we didn't want to become like EUROPE?!?!?

Seriously, that's cool though.

[Warpy]

3. We have so much stuff from Star Trek I

Whoever thought we'd have those flip phone communicators back in the early 60s? Cell phones came out in the 70s, but they were generally huge things with very limited range and not available in most of the country and most of them were used as car phones because they were too clunky to carry around.

We don't have replicators, but the 3 D printer stuff is getting pretty exciting.

The only thing I don't expect to see, ever, is the transporter. They came up with that because they didn't have enough money to build more than one shuttle mockup.

[DhhD]

4. They are using entanglement between two photons to transport an electron a very short distance.

[Warpy]

5. I know, it only works at a quantum level for now

but, by golly, it does work.

[Thor_MN]

7. 89 miles is a very short distance?

http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/135561-new-quantum-teleportation-record-paves-the-way-towards-a-worldwide-quantum-network

A team of international researchers have successfully teleported a quantum bit (qubit) over a record distance of 143 kilometers (89 miles), between the Canary Islands of La Palma and Tenerife. This distance is significant, as it is roughly the same distance to low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites — meaning it is now theoretically possible to build a satellite-based quantum communication network.

[samsingh]

6. cool