From Popular Science:
It works by shining a hollow laser beam around small glass particles, as Inside Science explains. The air around the particle heats up, but the hollow center of the beam stays cool. The heated air molecules keep the object balanced in the dark center. But a small amount of light sneaks into the hollow, warming the air on one side of the object and nudging it along the length of the laser beam. Researchers can change the speed and direction of the glass object by changing the lasers' brightness.
The system needs heated air or gas to work, so in its present incarnation it wouldn't work in space -- sorry, Star Wars fans. But it could be used for a variety of purposes on Earth, like biological research or movement of hazardous materials.
Other things have been moved with light before, but we're talking things the size of bacteria moved a few millimeters, not glass particles moved five feet, which (relatively speaking) is a huge advance. And it's actually a little better than that.
But Andrei Rhode and colleagues at the Australian National University say their new laser device can move glass objects hundreds of times bigger than bacteria, and shove them a meter and a half (5 feet) or more. Rhode says the 1.5-meter limit was only because of the size of the table where he placed his lasers -- he thinks he can move objects up to 10 meters, or about 30 feet.
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