Collaborate Disseminate
Many indoor plant enthusiasts already know that mirrors can be used to direct more sunlight onto plants that need it. Scientists have now developed a method of applying that same principle to endangered tree seedlings that are struggling to grow in sha… Continue reading Forest-floor mirrors give shaded seedlings a 175% growth-boost
We’ve covered a scanning laser project by Ben Make’s Everything last year, and now he’s back with a significant update. [Ben]’s latest project now offers a higher resolution and RGB …read more Continue reading Upgraded Raster Laser Projector Goes RGB
If you’re not really into salt-water tanks or don’t spend a lot of time in coral reefs, there’s still a high probability you may have heard of the bluestreak cleaner wrasse fish. Likely because last year it passed the “mirror test”, showing that it can… Continue reading Self-aware fish flexes in mirror before fighting
Helium-neon lasers may be little more than glorified neon signs, but there’s just something about that glowing glass tube that makes the whole process of stimulated emission easier to understand. …read more Continue reading Lasers Al Fresco: Fun with Open-Cavity Lasers
Lasers are pretty much magic — it’s all done with mirrors. Not every laser, of course, but in the 1980s, the most common lasers in commercial applications were probably the …read more Continue reading More Mirrors (and a Little Audio) Mean More Laser Power
We once thought that the best houses on Halloween were the ones that gave out full-size candy bars. While that’s still true, these days we’d rather see a cool display …read more Continue reading Bone-Shaking Haunted Mirror Uses Stable Diffusion
We knew the mirrors in our house were not really very good mirrors, optically speaking. Your mirror eats up 20 to 40 percent of the light that hits it. High-quality …read more Continue reading Dielectric Mirror Shines Bright
[Hank Green] posted an interesting video about the first liquid mirror telescope from back in the 1850s. At the time, scientists were not impressed. But, these days, people are revisiting …read more Continue reading Toxic Telescope Makes You Mad as a Hatter
One of the Star Trek movies has a McGuffin called “transparent aluminum.” While magic mirrors aren’t really transparent, it appears that way to a casual observer. If you haven’t seen …read more Continue reading Magic Mirror Isn’t Transparent Metal
The term “adaptive optics” sounds like something that should be really complicated and really expensive. And in general, the ability to control the properties of optical elements is sufficiently difficult …read more Continue reading A Tiny Forest of Resistors Makes for Quick and Dirty Adaptive Optics