From: Tim Jones <Tim.Jones@S...>
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 11:42:03 -0000
Subject: DS2/SG2 - It's a gun Jim but not as we know it
This is off topic ish - but of relevance to the 'reality freaks' out there, perhaps - applicable to the DirtGrunt games, when we will have small enough lasers... -- This is a report in the Times newspaper, today 30th October 1997. I had to check the date several times just to be sure it is not April the 1st or something!! By Robert Uhlig, Technology Correspondent AN American inventor has boldly gone where no other weapons maker has been before. Inspired by Star Trek, Hans Eric Herr, a Californian, has developed a hand-held laser gun that can shock, stun and kill. Like the phaser used in the science-fiction series, the device developed by Mr Herr bombards human targets with electrical pulses to stun painlessly, induce painful convulsions or even prompt a heart attack. Less sophisticated stun weapons have already been made, but these use either wires or a jet of water to make contact with the victim and transmit electrical stun pulses of up to 10,000 volts. The liquid system often spills into droplets and the wire version, called a taser, has to be reloaded for each use. The phaser gun patented by Mr Herr, of San Diego, has none of these disadvantages and most of the attributes of Captain Kirk and Spock's intergalactic weapon of choice. It uses an intense laser beam of ultraviolet light to create a plasma channel - an electrically-charged air-beam - along which it discharges a precise electrical current to immobolise its victim. The multiple-shot phaser evades legal restrictions on laser weapons because it uses a wavelength of light that would take several minutes to blind. According to a report in New Scientist, the phaser can penetrate clothing and has a range of more than 300ft. However, despite having the characteristics of Star Trek phasers, Mr Herr's invention has a crucial handicap. Using current technology, the smallest lasers needed to power the gun are the size of a kitchen table. Nevertheless, Mr Herr is confident that there are ways to make his stunning invention smaller, and probably more powerful. Prof Anthony Bell, an expert on laser-produced plasmas at Imperial College, London, supported Mr Herr's assertion that a holster-sized phaser is not far off. "Technology is developing so rapidly that given a few years you might have something that is quite portable," he said. "There's nothing here I would rule out."