15th Century
Disintermediation
My first job was as a graduate trainee for a merchant bank in the City in the late 1980s and among the many buzzwords that the Slick Willies of that profession used to bandy about [more…]
Technology
21st Century
Pandora’s Bug
How long ago it seems! But it is barely four years since I was a senior researcher at Porton Down, sitting on a shiny chair at a varnished desk and tapping the delicate keyboard of [more…]
Computing
El Cnutador’s Auto Responsive Seeing Eye
Introduction I have always been interested in image processing since my Computer Science and subsequent employment in document management systems. For my final year project, I failed in the ultimate aim simply because back then [more…]
20th Century
Callsign Revlon
On 25th October 1994 29 year old US Navy Lieutenant Kara Hultgreen was killed whilst attempting to land on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Pacific Ocean. The case remains highly controversial to [more…]
Engineering
Making A Ruby Laser – Part Five
Melting a hole through steel: The above image needs a little explanation! The Doc messed up his camera settings and under exposed the image. So I loaded it into Gimp and played with the curves [more…]
Engineering
Making A Ruby Laser – Part Four
The Doc’s ruby laser focused onto a lighter flint. The flint has been glued to the end of a match stick. The ‘explosion’ measures approximately 4 inches diameter. Interesting things to note are the ‘candy [more…]
Engineering
Making A Ruby Laser – Part Three
More information on laser speckle can be found here: Speckle pattern A Mirror Alignment Tool The most important part of constructing a ruby laser (or any laser with external mirrors) are getting the mirrors alligned [more…]
Engineering
Making A Ruby Laser – Part Two
(a ruby rod lit by two bright blue LEDs. Due to the IR filter in my camera the pink colour is actually red. What you are seeing is the absorption of the blue light and the [more…]
Engineering
Making A Ruby Laser – Part One
Introduction For many years the Doc has had the desire to attempt the construction of a ruby laser. After six months of hard work, disappointment, late nights, lots of booze and a drained bank account [more…]