Gamma-ray lasers (grasers) and superhigh-power lasers
Can a laser-like device be built that emits coherent gamma rays (a 'graser'), using nuclear rather than atomic transitions, and how far can achievable laser intensities be pushed?
History and references
Partly settled. Some of it is understood, some is still argued about.
Ginzburg's problem #12 grouped rasers/grasers with superhigh-power lasers. Laser intensity and pulse control have advanced enormously since 1999: petawatt-class facilities and the Extreme Light Infrastructure became operational, chirped-pulse amplification earned the 2018 Nobel Prize, attosecond-pulse generation earned the 2023 Nobel Prize, and X-ray free-electron lasers ('rasers') began operating (LCLS, 2009). A true gamma-ray laser (graser) using nuclear transitions, however, remains unrealized as of 2026.
A laser is stimulated emission tamed into a beam; doing the same trick at nuclear-transition energies would give a coherent gamma-ray searchlight nature has never built.
References
- What problems of physics and astrophysics seem now to be especially important and interesting (thirty years later, already on the verge of the XXI century)?, V L Ginzburg, Physics-Uspekhi 42 (4) 353-373, 1999
- The Nobel Prize in Physics 2018 (chirped pulse amplification), NobelPrize.org press release, 2018
- The Nobel Prize in Physics 2023 (attosecond pulses), NobelPrize.org press release, 2023
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