Lead
In recent years, the United States has imposed a blockade on China in the field of semiconductors and lithography machines, and then imposed an all-round blockade on Huawei, triggering a Sino-US technology war.
However, instead of being beaten passively, the Chinese naturally have a way to counter Western countries, and China not only condemns the United States' practices, but also implements a "no fight, no deal" policy against the United States.
In addition to the field of semiconductors and lithography machines, China has also taken a different path and imposed a blockade on this thing, which has attracted the attention of Western countries.
But what is this thing?
The origin of optical lasers.
A laser, as the name suggests, is a device used to produce light.
The process of light generation is the process by which electrons transition from a high-energy excited state to a low-energy excited state, releasing a photon, thus forming light.
Then, the laser is light, that is, it converts electrical energy into light energy, and the wavelength of electromagnetic waves is in the range of hundreds of nanometers to one millimeter, and the electromagnetic waves generated by this electrical energy are called lasers.
The generation of light is the process of the photoelectric effect.
The generation of laser light is a basic application of this process, but in this process, we do not excite electrons, but through other methods, such as optical cavities, semiconductors, etc., to achieve the purpose of excitation electrons.
In fact, when it comes to lasers, we Chinese can proudly say that our ancestors invented lasers early.
The first laser produced was a phospholite.
When a piece of phosphorite is rubbed, it emits a burst of light.
The principle of this light is actually the light produced by the electrons being excited by the action of friction, from this principle, this is actually a kind of static electricity, and the principle of static electricity is the photoelectric effect.
However, the truly controllable laser was invented in the last 100 years.
Among them, the Chinese also have many scholars specializing in this area, such as Qian Xuesen, Wang Ganchang, etc., all of whom have made important contributions to the research of lasers.
As early as the 50s of the last century, the mainland took the lead in creating a laser emitting device.
This emitting device uses an argon ion laser, which is the lack of industrial raw materials that are replaced by rare earth materials, which is neodymium glass.
So, what is neodymium glass produced by lasers?
What is neodymium glass and what is it for.
Neodymium glass is the glass that is rich in neodymium elements inside, and generally speaking, the sand is smelted at a high temperature to melt into molten glass at a temperature of 3000 °C.
Generally speaking, the content of neodymium in neodymium glass is 10~30ppm.
In order to dissolve neodymium into glass water, the melting temperature must be increased, which can reach more than 2000 °C.
If neodymium is dissolved into glass water, neodymium nitrate solution is poured into the glass melt channel to reduce neodymium nitrate to neodymium metal, and neodymium can be reduced at high temperatures of 300 and 400 °C.
It is necessary to increase the melting temperature, and now it is also necessary to reduce neodymium nitrate at high temperatures, which makes it very difficult for countries with average melting temperature to study a low-melting neodymium glass.
However, even high-melting neodymium glass is not so easy for the mainland.
In the 80s of the last century, the mainland began to study neodymium glass, but it has not been able to promote the application, it can only be said that the research is still stagnant in the lush stage, and there are still many problems that have not been solved.
Neodymium glass can be used as an optical material, with good optical properties, the light transmitted through is very good, and neodymium can also be used as an optical material for research.
There is also a broad term, that is, laser materials.
Laser, that is, stimulates the amplified light, and it must have energy, so it needs to have neodymium in it to amplify the excited light.
The excitation tube is the laser, and the laser pointer and laser shaver we see in daily life are a simple application of the laser.
The performance of neodymium glass in the field of optics has obvious advantages.
Moreover, in high-power lasers, neodymium-containing laser materials are basically used.
In the 80s of the last century, the mainland has begun to grow explosively in the research of high-power laser neodymium glass.
In recent years, our high-power laser neodymium glass has been greatly developed, especially in the navy, using neodymium glass as raw material, the lasers produced are applied to the navy.
In actual operations, targeting targets of drones and unmanned ships on the ground and in the sky, using lasers to strike, the battle loss rate is extremely low, far exceeding the battle loss rate of the United States.
For this special glass, although the manufacturing level of the mainland is not so high, it has overcome the problem in the continuous smelting technology and has become the only country in the world that produces a full set of large-size and high-power laser neodymium glass.
Continental's superiority in laser research.
In the research of lasers, not only other mainland experts will discuss together, but also experts from the United States will join in.
So, why did the mainland choose neodymium glass as a raw material, instead of using other materials like other countries?
Probably, when other countries use other raw materials, they will get twice the result with half the effort, and we are still on the way.
In the field of mainland research, it is mainly associated with national defense as early as possible, and special attention is paid to national defense applications, so the road of neodymium glass will be chosen.
So, why did we choose this path.
In a word, the road is walked by people.
We are good at doing research in this area, so we will naturally embark on this path.
There are two main types of laser materials, one is laser crystal, which is suitable for lasers with high optical performance.
There is also laser glass, which is suitable for high-power lasers, which plays a great role in national defense.
Therefore, we will choose this path, and on this road we will gradually walk out of our own path, because we are leading on this road.
And later, we slowly walked in the front row of the world, both in terms of technology and application, and we have been at a very advanced level.
We are also leading the way in this area.
epilogue
The high-tech field is not only a competition in the technological situation, but also involves issues of national security and national strategy, as well as issues of a country's dignity and territorial integrity.
At this time, it cannot be compared with ordinary products and commodities, so the country must have a skilful strategic vision in this regard, and it is necessary to protect some key technologies and resources, which are all strategic issues of a country.
At the same time, laser technology has a wide range of applications, including the defense field, as well as medical, communication and other fields.
Developments in these areas are beneficial to a country.
Therefore, related research and development are very valuable, and related research requires continuous investment, and at the same time, it is necessary to always maintain a heart of learning and exploration in the research process.
Only through continuous research and innovation can we achieve better results.
At the same time, in the research process of laser neodymium glass in China, generations of outstanding scientists have also been trained, and we would like to pay tribute to them and learn from them.