Arizona State University Physics Professor Kong-Thon Tsen and his son Shaw-Wei Tsen might be holding the key for curing, if not totally eliminating, deadly viruses such as hepatitis and HIV. They reportedly found out that viruses can be destroyed by using ultrashort-pulse lasers or USPs.

According to them, we must find a way to remove these viruses from our system because vaccinations are sometimes insufficient. In the study conducted by the father and son tandem, it was demonstrated that this laser technique was able to shatter the protein shell (capsid) of the tobacco mosaic virus.

What was left of the mosaic virus after the experimentation was just a "harmless mucus-like mash of molecules." Interestingly, the Tsens mentioned that the energy used to destroy the mosaic virus was 40 times lower than the threshold for human cells. Surpassing the limit would cause harm to the human T-cells.

We ran a report back in June of this year concerning USPs and the company Raydiance Inc., which is planning to fully-developed the technology to be used in other fields aside from physics such as medicine and biology. Hearing about the Tsens' accomplishment, Raydiance Inc. President Scott Davison had this to say:

The extreme brevity of these pulses is creating a physical effect that traditional lasers and other types of non-laser approaches can't do. What we see is a new wave of exploration and discovery in applying USP in a whole bunch of industries and applications.

  

There's a new company in Petaluma, California called Raydiance Inc. that's tinkering with the possibility of creating a new type of laser that doesn't generate any kind of heat. This new technology, which creates intense ultrashort burst of photons, originally began as a military research.

Scientifically speaking, the above mentioned ultrashort burst of photons only last for "femtoseconds" and one unit of that time duration equals a billionth of a millionth of a second. Raydiance Inc. believes that this new invention could create a revolution in the laser industry.

When used properly, this type of laser can be used for a lot of purposes ranging from removing skin tattoo without burning the skin, wrinkle removal, and killing cancer cells without affecting healthy ones. U.S. Food and Drug Administration senior optical scientist Ronald Waynant further explained the process,

You're putting an awful lot of power into a small place in a very short period of time. The electrons are just blown out of the area, vaporizing the material that was in that spot. What is important is that you don't transfer the heat. It's different than the old lasers with longer pulses, where you used to create a lot of thermal damage.

Raydiance Inc. CEO Barry Schuler admitted that the technology is not really new as it is being used in military laboratories for some time now. The difference with their system is that they "miniaturized" the gigantic setups found in the said labs. He added,

These ultrashort pulse lasers create unique interactions with matter that have only been done before in university environments. Now we're making this capability inexpensive. We hope to seed an explosion of innovation. We're moving into the era of light. We call it the light age.

Before starting up Raydiance, Schuler used to run America Online (AOL) after its merger with Time Warner. The laser company currently has around 30 employees and has already spent a total of US$ 25 million on the ultrashort pulse laser project.