Laser Turns 50...

The LASER (Light Amplification by Simulated Emission of Radiation) is 50 years young May 16, when Theodore Maiman built the first working laser at Hughes Research Labs. While initially leveraged towards military applications such as targeting, the laser eventually found its way to a wide variety of civilian uses, from communications and rock-concert visuals to CD players and tattoo removal. Although Maiman is credited with building the first working laser, a number of other researchers and scientists spent the decades following World War II developing new theories about the technology. Albert Einstein is credited with theorizing about stimulated emission, the physics underlying lasers, as far back as 1917.