Scientists invent laser that could uncover hidden planets

Sign up to our free weekly IndyTech newsletter delivered straight to your inbox Sign up to our free IndyTech newsletter Sign up to our free IndyTech newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Professor Derryck Reid of Heriot-Watt said: “Astrocombs allow astronomers to make extremely sensitive wavelength measurements of the spectrum of light, potentially tens to hundreds of times better than conventional technology. “Until now, astrocombs operated mainly in the green-to-red part of the spectrum of light, but the shorter-wavelength ultraviolet to blue-green region is rich in the atomic absorption features of interest to astronomers. “Our new approach for the first time provides a continuous sequence of optical markers from the ultraviolet to the blue-green that serve as a precision wavelength scale in this part of the spectrum.” open image in gallery This August 1989 image provided by NASA shows the planet Neptune photographed by the Voyager 2 spacecraft Prof Reid’s team is developing the technology for the Extremely Large Telescope, currently under construction in Chile. “Importantly, we’ve achieved a wide and continuous spectrum of ultraviolet to blue-green colours using a laser with remarkably low power, and of the same kind already in use in some astronomical telescopes.” Dr Samantha Thompson, an astrophysics senior research associate at Cambridge, added: “This is a really exciting development that will enable us to study smaller planets on longer orbits than ever before – with the aim of discovering the first ‘Earth-like’ planet orbiting around a nearby sun-like star.”