Why can't we see a laser beam going across the room?

While traveling through the vacuum of space, laser beams are invisible unless shot directly into your eye. The experience you know of as vision consists of light entering your eyes and being detecting by cells on your retinas. You can't see any light that never enters your eyes.
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Why a laser beam is invisible when it travels through air but can be seen as it strikes a white screen?

Light travels in straight lines. A laser produces light, but unless the laser light bounces off of something, or shines directly into your eyes (a very bad idea, since this can damage your eyes), you cannot see it. The beam is invisible in normal air.
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Can laser beam pass through walls?

Visible-light lasers, with a dot or beam that you can see, will be blocked by walls or other light-blocking material.
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Why can't you see the laser light when it travels along its path but you can see it on the wall or when you place an object in front of the laser?

You can see the laser spot on the wall because the light is scattered by the wall.
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Can a laser break a mirror?

Yes, lasers bounce off of mirrors with less power than what they had when they were initially fired. This occurs because the energy in the laser is conserved, but some is lost to powering the mirror.
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Could you avoid being hit by a laser if you were in a room of mirrors?



Can a mirror stop a laser weapon?

The actual answer is no, it can't. Even a mirror that reflects 95% of a lethal laser beam will still absorb enough heat to burn. This causes the reflectivity to be gone almost instantly, but a scattered burst of light from the point of impact could still blind the shooter or his allies.
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Is it illegal to shine a laser pointer into someone house?

Regardless of the user's age, it's illegal to point, shine or focus a laser pointer at someone "in a manner that can reasonably be expected to cause harassment, annoyance or fear of injury to such other person."
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How do you see invisible laser beams?

To see a laser beam as it passes through air, you need to introduce larger particles - dust or smoke or aerosol spray - to scatter some of the light from the beam in the direction of your eye. Dust particles tend to get trapped in the beam and can remain there for a few minutes.
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Can lasers melt glass?

In general, glass can be cut by applying a high-energy laser to melt it. Two other methods of cutting glass include engraving and etching.
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Can you see a laser beam without smoke?

It is definitely not possible to see any laser beams in the air without having particles in the air!
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Can you see a green laser beam?

Interestingly enough, the human eye's ability to see peaks around the green wavelength, so even though that is a higher wavelength than blue light, it may be easier to spot a green laser.
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What happens if you point a laser at a phone camera?

It is virtually impossible to protect your smartphone camera lens from lasers, so if they take a direct hit, it will damage your cameras lens permanently. The only fix is a new lens which in reality will mean a new phone.
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Can my laser reach the moon?

The typical red laser pointer is about 5 milliwatts, and a good one has a tight enough beam to actually hit the Moon—though it'd be spread out over a large fraction of the surface when it got there. The atmosphere would distort the beam a bit, and absorb some of it, but most of the light would make it.
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Can you see infrared lasers?

They can be used to locate and identify targets while being invisible to the naked eye. However, like an IR laser they are visible to everyone with a night vision device.
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Do we have laser weapons?

The U.S. Army is just a few small steps away from fielding its first combat-ready, high-powered laser weapon. Over the summer, such a weapon was mounted on a Stryker military vehicle and used in tests at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in a “combat shoot-off” against a series of possible combat scenarios.
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Are green laser pens illegal?

Whilst owning a laser pen is not illegal if a person had one in the street and was using it (or intending to use it) to shine in people's eyes, at cars or aircraft etc. then they would be committing an offence and, in the case of cars and aircraft, a particularly serious offence.
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What happens if u shine a laser at a plane?

Laser light in the pilot's eyes causes glare (inability to see past the light). At higher power levels, it can also cause temporary flashblindness and afterimages (like when you look at a bright camera flash, and cannot see for a many seconds afterwards).
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Can a blue laser burn?

Briday Class 4 laser pointers are the perfect choices to used as a burning tool. In contrast to green or red laser pointers, blue laser beam is dim but more powerful to able get stuffs burned.
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Will lasers replace bullets?

For certain niche scenarios, lasers might prove themselves ideal. It seems unlikely, however, that they will ever outright replace missiles and bullets, as they do in so much sci-fi warfare. "No conventional weapon is a panacea," said Douglas Beason, former associate lab director at Los Alamos National Laboratory.
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Can two lasers cancel each other?

Actually, when two laser beams (or any other kinds of light for that matter) collide, they do not stop each other. In fact, usually they behave as though the other is not there at all. This is because light is a wave, and usually waves cross each other without interacting.
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Can a laser shoot down a missile?

The U.S. Navy reports that it has shot down a simulated cruise missile using an all-electric laser weapon for the first time ever. The Navy has used a laser to shoot down a missile before - but long ago, and with a much different technology.
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