Question: do you know when lazer guns will be invented? or if they are invented me and my teacher are very keen to find this out

Graham Wiggins answered on 17 Jun 2014:

jnorth001 – Laser guns
We currently have laser guided wepons, I guess you are after a gun that fires a pulse of laser light instead of a bullet ?
Problem 1/
power. to make the pulse of laser beam powerfull enough, you’d need a lot of power, so a huge generator the size of several lorries would be needed. makes your gun too heavy for one person to use, and needs lots of fuel + support truck to move it 🙁
Problem 2/
reflection – what happens if the beam bounces off your target ? might fry yourself 🙁
Problem 3/ Powerful lasers turn the air into a plasma as the beam passes through it. which means your beam will a) make a lot of noise, like a lightning bolt makes thunder and b) lose power on it’s way to the target
problem 4/ – probably illegal ! there are laws about what weapons systems can be made + used in wartime, so you’d need to check the various treaties on arms limitaions permit your new laser gun….
So there are big problem to using a powerful laser outside in fresh air. Traditional weapons systems with laser guiding ( eg the projectile follows the beam to target ) are still pretty good, leaving laser guns in the Sci-fi World for a while yet.
Sorreeee,
Graham