Plasma lasers A cut above the rest

摘要

Whether they are building ships or chips, construction industries need precise tools to slice through the materials of their trade. These days, that precision is often provided by laser beams and plasma jets. Both are good at cutting, but both have disadvantages. Lasers use a huge amount of power and cannot penetrate reflective surfaces. Plasma (hot, ionised gas) consumes less power, but it can slice neither as neatly nor as finely as a laser. At a recent meeting of Britain's Institute of Physics, in Brighton, however, Ahmed Al-Shamma'a, an engineer at Liverpool University, and his colleagues described new techniques for dealing with both shortcomings.