furraniumJul 31, 2024
Okay, story time. I was asked for the tale of my laser eye injury, so here you go. I'm fine. Customers were fine. No children were harmed. The only victims were me and Bob's career. https://www.funraniumlabs.com/2024/07/how-i-got-my-laser-eye-injury/
How I Got My Laser Eye Injury - Funranium Labs

It has been brought to my attention that I have never actually written this story down before, merely told it in person to many students for valuable lessons and also for laughs over cocktails. It is a litany of bad ideas from several people that all came together at once to reach out and zap … Continue reading "How I Got My Laser Eye Injury"

Funranium Labs
Show threadAaron Sawdey, Ph.D.Aug 1, 2024
@funranium Nice. The bit about the goggles reminds me of the physics lab I worked in one summer long long ago ... their optical train started with an IR source and went through several frequency doubling steps to get into UV. So, the joke was that the only way we could get eyewear to protect against all those steps was to spray paint it black. Fortunately I never had to go in that lab when it was on, my project involved a 5W argon-ion laser in a different room.
Show threadfurraniumAug 1, 2024
@acsawdey So, as the person who specifies eyewear, I can definitively tell you they fed a line of bullshit.
Show threadMimirAug 1, 2024
@funranium ooh, how does eyewear that protects against that work? A bunch of stacked filters, or something cleverer?
Show threadGraham Sutherland / PolynomialAug 1, 2024
@mimir @funranium I'm imagining a comb filter as a solution but I don't recall if those are suitably shaped and cheap enough for use on goggles. but then I've only ever looked at that stuff in the context of the Kerr effect and interferometry. would certainly be interested in knowing how it's actually handled.
Show threadMimir
@gsuberland i guess you could do a "default-deny" approach and just put a narrow bandpass filter on...who needs to see color, anyhow
Aug 1, 2024 at 6:25amWeb
Show threadAndrew ZonenbergAug 1, 2024

@mimir @gsuberland There's a reason many-line laser goggles have really low visible light transmission (I've seen figures of 15% or less).

Thankfully the only optical protection I need in my lab is for high intensity 365nm UV (not coherent, but like a watt of collimated optical power focused to a small spot).

And I found a pair of NoIR goggles that are IIRC OD 6.0 at 365nm but transmit most of the visible wavelengths starting around mid-green, something like 70% transmission across the visible band.

OTOH we have a (currently inactive and unplugged) laser at work that's 1064 / 532 / 354 (YAG with nonlinear doubler/tripler crystals). If we ever decide to set it back up again I can't imagine the required tri-line goggles will let much visible through...