Real-life tractor beam in the works

After more than 40 years, is the tractor beam —a staple on the hit sci-fi series "Star Trek"— ready to make the jump from Trekkies' TV screens to real life?

 

Two New York University professors, David Ruffner and David Grier, developed a way to use "coaxial Bessel beams" to trap and transport matter, albeit at a microscopic scale for now.

 

"These optical conveyors have periodic intensity variations along their axes that act as highly effective optical traps for micrometer-scale objects. Varying the Bessel beams' relative phase shifts the traps axially thereby selectively transports trapped objects either downstream or upstream along the length of the beam," they said in their paper.

 

Ruffner and Grier said it is possible to have arrays of independent optical conveyors allow for bi-directional transport in three dimensions.

 

A separate article on Phys.org said the two used their technique to pull 30 micrometer-sized silica spheres suspended in water, towards a laser source.

 

Phys.org described a Bessel beam, named after its creator Friedrich Bessel, as a type of laser that directs light in concentric circles around a single dot rather than as a single beam.

 

It said the light from a Bessel beam, at the dot, is not diffracted, and can re-form if it encounters an object in its path.

 

"(T)his property ... allows for pulling a particle, the team found," Phys.org said.

 

Too much energy needed

 

But Phys.org said that, at least for now, the tractor beam the two researchers built may require far too much energy if scaled up to move large objects, and may destroy the objects. — TJD, GMA News