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Someone else had invented "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation" -- better known as the laser -- but Maiman, at the time an employee of Hughes Research Laboratories in southern California, won the race to actually make a working unit. "It worked the first time," Maiman remembered later. "But to tell you the truth, I was a little numbed.... I did not appreciate the gravity of what I had done." Newspapers didn't know what to think: "Man Invents Death Ray" screamed one panicked headline. But realizing that they'd have many more practical applications, Maiman quit his job at Hughes to work on lasers full time. Derided by many as "a solution looking for a problem," the laser made hundreds of new things possible from supermarket bar code scanners to CD players to advanced eye surgery. Indeed the laser has been such a big impact on society that Maiman was nominated for a Nobel Prize, was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, and won the Japan Prize, the Wolf Prize in Physics, and the Oliver E. Buckley Condensed Matter Prize from the American Physical Society. He died in B.C., Canada, on May 5 from systemic mastocytosis, a genetic disease affecting connective tissue. He was 79. From This is True for 6 May 2007 Suggestions for further reading:
 By: Laurie Notaro List Price: $20.00 Amazon Price: $13.60  By: Krishna KandarpaJohn E Aruny List Price: $54.95 Amazon Price: $54.95 Editorial Review: The Third Edition of this popular, practical, take-along handbook features twenty new chapters and extensive updates throughout to keep pace with the rapid growth of interventional radiology. Focusing on protocols and equipment, the book explains how to perform all current interventional radiology procedures--from pulmonary angiography and vein embolization to biopsy, drainage, and stenting. Coverage also includes satellite issues, such as risk management, outpatient care, and drugs and dosages. The outline format makes information easy to find, review, and remember...and the compact pocket size enables residents and practitioners to carry all the information they need with them.  By: Ralph MetsonSteven Mardon List Price: $14.95 Amazon Price: $10.46 Editorial Review: From a leading expert at one of the world's most respected medical schools----learn how to beat sinus infections once and for all. Nobody needs to tell you how painful and annoying sinus problems can be--the pounding headaches and congestion, the perpetually runny nose, and the debilitating fatigue, not to mention sleepless nights, lost work, and ruined vacations. Now you can do something about it by learning what a top expert tells his patients.  By: Bahaa E. A. SalehMalvin Carl Teich List Price: $148.50 Amazon Price: $118.80 Editorial Review: Now in a new full-color edition, Fundamentals of Photonics, Second Edition is a self-contained and up-to-date introductory-level textbook that thoroughly surveys this rapidly expanding area of engineering and applied physics. Featuring a logical blend of theory and applications, coverage includes detailed accounts of the primary theories of light, including ray optics, wave optics, electromagnetic optics, and photon optics, as well as the interaction of photons and atoms, and semiconductor optics. Presented at increasing levels of complexity, preliminary sections build toward more advanced topics, such as Fourier optics and holography, guided-wave and fiber optics, semiconductor sources and detectors, electro-optic and acousto-optic devices, nonlinear optical devices, optical interconnects and switches, and optical fiber communications. Each of the twenty-two chapters of the first edition has been thoroughly updated. The Second Edition also features entirely new chapters on photonic-crystal optics (including multilayer and periodic media, waveguides, holey fibers, and resonators) and ultrafast optics (including femtosecond optical pulses, ultrafast nonlinear optics, and optical solitons). The chapters on optical interconnects and switches and optical fiber communications have been completely rewritten to accommodate current technology. Each chapter contains summaries, highlighted equations, exercises, problems, and selected reading lists. Examples of real systems are included to emphasize the concepts governing applications of current interest.  By: Paul Goodison List Price: $33.67 Amazon Price: $24.90 |
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