Word: lasered
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Like so many other triumphs of science, the laser has become a double-edged sword. Capable of producing an enormously powerful, very narrow beam of light, it has been used to perform delicate surgery on the retina of the eye, puncture tiny holes in material as hard as diamonds, produce three-dimensional pictures called holograms, and even measure the distance from earth to the moon (with an error of only a few inches). But the laser can also be used for less peaceful purposes. It provides, for example, the guiding light for the Air Force's extremely accurate "smart...
Much of the Pentagon's laser weaponry research is conducted in great secrecy at Kirtland Air Force Base, outside of Albuquerque, at a desert site not far from Los Alamos, the birthplace of the atomic bomb. To some experts, the project (code-named "Eighth Card") is almost as important as the Manhattan Project three decades ago. It is not for security reasons alone that frequent warnings are issued to commercial and private planes to keep away from Kirtland; laser beams fired at the base's new weaponry range are known to have ignited wooden targets at a distance...
...project and early this summer finally completed some complex calculations on possible means of controlling thermonuclear fusion-the same awesome process that fires the sun and other stars. The goal of LoDato's work was hardly new; like many scientists in laboratories round the world, he proposed using laser beams to reach the enormous temperatures (as high as several hundred million degrees) needed to sustain fusion reactions. Nonetheless, LoDato felt that his contribution was sufficiently original to justify his request for an $80,000 grant from the AEC to pay for computer analysis of his complex equations...
...another big raid, Air Force F4 Phantoms using both laser-guided and general purpose bombs attacked a fuel depot 35 miles northeast of Hanoi. Pilots reported many direct hits, numerous secondary explosion and fires, and a pipeline...
...weeks, U.S. Air Force and Navy bombers have pounded North Viet Nam with unprecedented fury, using a new technology of "smart" bombs guided by television or laser beams to destroy bridges, power plants and factories. The U.S. purpose, according to Lieut. General George Eade, Air Force Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans and Operations, has been threefold: to prevent new supplies from reaching North Viet Nam from the Soviet Union or China, to destroy supplies already on hand and to prevent additional ones from reaching the North Vietnamese forces in the South...