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People can’t even tell how much cheap oil is in olive oil, let alone “extra virgin olive oil” vs. el cheapo olive oil. Take it from this old laser spectrocopist. When there’s 75 mirror mounts on a 4 foot by 8 foot table, with a Chinese graduate student handcuffed to the table to adjust them, it’s at least a decade away. When you can buy a frequency comb laser on Aliexpress, now we’re talking.



Why did you handcuff a grad student to the table?


It's like how Odysseus demanded to be tied to the mast of his ship, so he wouldn't be tempted by the Sirens.

The grad student doesn't want to be tempted by the software industry offering to quintuple his salary.

(Disclosure: Former physics grad student, who tended a similar optics bench).


forget software, they all go into starting boutique bakeries


Some one needs to be handcuffed to the table to poke it with a stick when needed.


Presumably they require constant high-precision adjustment and a lot of domain knowledge. I'd read it that the only way to do it now is with a high-maintenance setup and a lot of technicians.


Yea, buy why handcuffs? Is it to limit range of motion when taking precision measurements?


I believe this was a figure of speech to illustrate that the student has to stay right by the table, not that the student is actually being handcuffed


Why does the student need to be Chinese? And is that Chinese as in from China or Chinese as in having Chinese heritage?


It’s to help avoid the expensive lawsuits - they usually come pre-conditioned to not make a fuss.


To stop them leaving academia for the private sector.


searching for "frequency comb laser" on Aliexpress doesn't yield fitting results currently for me.

https://de.aliexpress.com/w/wholesale-frequency-comb-laser.h...


yes, that's the point.



Available on Aliexpress really is a solid indicator.




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