Scientists used to spend months hand-tuning lasers. MIT built a robot that does it unsupervised in half an hour.
MIT researchers have developed a reconfigurable robotic optics lab that can assemble, align, monitor, and dismantle precision experiments with minimal human intervention. The system is designed to tackle one of the slowest parts of optics research: physically arranging mirrors, lenses and other components and repeatedly adjusting them until light behaves exactly as required.
The robot demonstrated its capabilities by building a tabletop laser cavity from randomly positioned components. It completed 50 maneuvers in about 30 minutes…
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