The LaserON Research Group is pleased to announce the publication of Laser Based Manufacturing, a new book published by CRC Press (Taylor & The LaserON Research Group at the University of Vigo is pleased to announce the launch of Misión Fotón, a free video game, and DifractON en casa, a companion website of light experiments for students, families and anyone curious about lasers.
Both were developed by our group following the Science Education strategy of the LaserON research group.
In Misión Fotón, players guide a laser beam with mirrors, beam splitters, lenses and dichroic mirrors through twelve missions based on real work from our laboratory: measuring a hair without touching it, sending light through a submarine cable, cutting steel, producing glass nanofibres with the Cofiblas process, printing titanium implants and making nanoparticles. At the end students can perform a profile test that will suggest which engineering or science path suits each player best. The game also includes a time-trial mode, with the same boards for everyone each hour, and a two-player duel.
DifractON en casa shows how to repeat the workshop experiments at home with a Class 2 laser pointer, a wall and a tape measure. It also offers fifteen more light experiments, a virtual laboratory, calculators, games, a laser safety card and a notebook to record measurements. It works on phones, tablets and computers, can be installed like an app and keeps working offline once opened. All data stay on the user’s device.
Both include two short animations made by our group. FOTÓN follows Fotonciño, a cheerful photon, through stimulated emission, diffraction, optical fibres, laser cutting and 3D-printed implants. Cofiblas, paso a paso explains how our patented process produces continuous glass nanofibres around 200 times thinner than a human hair.
With these tools, LaserON aims to bring laser science closer to secondary school students and to show the engineering and science careers behind everyday technologies. Both are free, in Spanish and need no account.
Misión Fotón: https://laseron.webs8.uvigo.es/mision-foton.html
DifractON en casa: https://laseron.webs8.uvigo.es/Difracton/index.html