ESA Offers Contract

The European Space Agency has offered Midaz Lasers Ltd. €150,000 for the development of an engineered version of the diode-pumped Alexandrite laser. The performance benefits of the Alexandrite laser include higher wall-plug efficiency and the possibility of tuning the system in the ultraviolet range. Midaz, a spin-out company of Imperial College London, says that the new technology could supersede the conventional Nd:YAG for space-based lidar, which measures a variety of atmospheric parameters.