A newly launched satellite aims to measure how Earth's rotation drags the fabric of space-time around itself - an effect of Einstein's general theory of relativity - ten times more accurately than ever before. The Laser Relativity Satellite 2 (LARES-2) launched from the European Space Agency (ESA) spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on 13 July.

Two Lithuanian companies and a Nobel Prize-winning professor have created and demonstrated a laser powerful enough to reduce nuclear waste decay from hundreds of years to just a few hours. The Single Cycle Laser SYLOS uses technology that 'transmutes' nuclear waste by bombarding atoms, and is being developed by 2018 Nobel Physics Prize co-winner, Professor Gerard Mourou.

The United States Army is developing a powerful new laser weapon capable of rapidly firing metal-vaporizing pulses, much like a machine gun. The new weapon, called the Tactical Ultrashort Pulsed Laser for Army Platforms, is expected to be about a million times stronger than any other laser weapon out there, New Scientist reports.

Mourou was the co-recipient of his Nobel with Donna Strickland for their development of Chirped Pulse Amplification (CPA) at the University of Rochester. In his speech, he referred to his "passion for extreme light."CPA produces high-intensity, super-short optical pulses that pack a tremendous amoun...