Like Thor's hammer Mjolnir, a powerful laser can grab hold of a lightning bolt and reroute its path through the sky. In a mountaintop experiment, the laser bent lightning toward a lightning rod, researchers report January 16 in Nature Photonics. Scientists have previously used lasers to wrangle electricity in the lab, but this is the first demonstration that the technique works in real-world storms. The finding could someday lead to better protection against lightning.
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