Donna Strickland’s Nobel Prize-awarded work involves creating extremely short and intense laser pulses. She used this laser rod in her experiments. It consists of glass treated with neodymium and was used to create infrared laser light. Strickland did her work when she was still a doctoral student at the University of Rochester.
Donna Strickland donated the photograph and laser rod to the Nobel Prize Museum in 2018.
During an experiment, a laser beam happened to hit one of Gerard Mourou’s students in the eye. When a doctor examined the damage, he asked which laser had caused it. When Mourou wondered why, he replied: “The injury is perfect!” The idea of using this type of laser as a precision instrument for eye surgery was born. This laser amplifier for use in eye surgery was developed at the University of Michigan in 1998.
Gerard Mourou donated the laser amplifier to the Nobel Prize Museum in 2018.
This “diffraction grating” is a glass sheet covered with a thin film of gold. The many microscopic lines in the surface split light into various wavelengths when it is reflected. Gerard Mourou used this diffraction grate to first spread out a laser pulse, then amplify it, and finally transform it into a short laser pulse far more intense than the original. The damage to the surface is from experiments with laser light that was too powerful.
Gerard Mourou donated the diffraction grating to the Nobel Prize Museum in 2018.
