Plasma and Lasers

plasma is known to block radio waves and whole bunch of other stuff, so... one small question:

Does plasma (aka plasma-stealth) absorb laser waves?

You would think that if you could sheath your craft in an envelope of Plasma (which is highly charged matter), then it would absorb at least some of the energy, same as any matter would. How effective it would be is another thing.

besides, laser energy is light (aka EM waves) and technically so are Radio waves, just at a higher frequency

[edit on 1-9-2004 by stumason]

Originally posted by stumason
... absorb at least some of the energy ...

somewhere on internet (long time ago), i read that plasma blocks laser beams. i just wanted to confirm this

so i was thinking, place one of those 100kg russian plasma generators on your hypersonic cruise missile - not ever laser will stop it.

Like I said, it would be like covering you missile in any other matter, just the Plasma would probably be more effective at absorbing the light (and lighter). If plasma can stop Radio waves, then it most certainly would have an effect of laser (as both are EM waves)

Originally posted by stumason
Like I said, it would be like covering you missile in any other matter, just the Plasma would probably be more effective at absorbing the light (and lighter). If plasma can stop Radio waves, then it most certainly would have an effect of laser (as both are EM waves)

Steel can also stop radio waves but use laser and you have a pretty deep hole . And plasma is NOT able to stop laser. Please don't compare weak EM radar waves with concentrated 100 kw (or 5MW) laser beam. It's like using paper to stop the bullet

Laser beam could be teoratically reflected by very advanced cooled mirror or VERY POWERFULL EM field (Star Trek shields ).

[edit on 2-9-2004 by longbow]

I merely stated that if it stops one kind of Em, it will HAVE AN EFFECT on another. I did question how effective it would be..............


oh, and radar isn't that weak, I know this from personal expierience, you can cook your breakfast with a Radar dish ...although granted it is no where near 100Kw or 5 Mw!

[edit on 2-9-2004 by stumason]

[edit on 2-9-2004 by stumason]

Originally posted by stumason

oh, and radar isn't that weak, I know this from personal expierience, you can cook your breakfast with a Radar dish

...although granted it is no where near 100Kw or 5 Mw!

And it is also not concentrated into a tight beam.

Sounds like a force-field "shield" type of thing against high watt lasers that can burn a hole through an airplane.

Yes, a high density plasma can stop a laser beam, it just depends on the density/flux. Unless you had a HUGE power supply or knew where the laser was going to be aimed and when, it would not be possible. Even if power was not a problem, the plasma would cook anyone looking out a window and would cause LOTS of heating of the hull. The electrodes would need active cooling too.

Originally posted by XL5
plasma would cook anyone looking out a window and would cause LOTS of heating of the hull. The electrodes would need active cooling too.

just to let you know that plasma exists at all temperatures. so, not neceseraly it will cause heating problems

Plasma doesn't necesarily block lasers as much as it absorbs most of the energy, that would explain why plasma sheilds are more popular, it absorbs the energy from laser.

But I guess it would be nice to have an alloy that deflects lasers.

So plasma can act as both stealth and a shield, but it depends on the power source aboard the aircraft, the more powerful the laser the more power you need for the plasma, the plasma to absorb the laser energy needs to have more energy than the shot itself, so if you had a positively charged particle cannon firing at a plasma shield, you better hope there are ten nuclear reactors behind that shield, if not it won't hold out.

There is a limit even to energy except more energy, the more the energy the more powerful the shield, but you have to understand that shields take more energy to power than lasers and need to over an open field of solid matter, so that would require massive amounts of energy.

So it would be better to have an alloy that deflects energy beams and lasers. Other than that, high powered lasers will be able to breach small low powered plasma shields on aircraft. The more you think about it, the harder it is to put a plasma shield on a fighter jet or bomber, maybe something larger and slower perhaps, high speed makes up for low amounts of power and high amounts of power make up for low speed.

It all seems to add up and equal the same thing, the slower something is it would need massive amounts of energy to move, the faster it is the less energy it can store for a shield(size does matter here).

I'm trying to explain this as simple as I possibly can, a fighter is too small to have a reactor powerful enough to power a plasma shield to absorb lasers, so speed makes up for that, and a carrier or a large transport plane has space to carry enough power for a plasma shield that absorbs energy from lasers to make up for that object not being able to move very quickly and not being so agile.

The faster something is, the less armor, the slower and bigger something is, the more armor it WOULD NEED, so does not mean it would automattically have alot of armor, I can build a massive ship and it could have no armor, not the point IT WOULD NEED alot of armor.

Shattered OUT...