Inventor of the laser Dr Charles Townes to be sequenced for Genome Laser art project (original) (raw)

I’m beyond excited to be able to share some intergalactic news: this afternoon I received a signed consent from a 98-year-old gentleman called Dr Charles Townes, for his genome to be sequenced for the Genome Laser art project at Burning Man.

In addition to inventing the laser in 1958, and winning the Nobel Prize in 1964, Charles’ accomplishments (listed below) are mind blowing and it is a honour for him to be associated with this project. About Genome Laser, Charles replied with one of his signature remarks: “I am delighted to see the laser useful”.

“How on Earth did this happen?”, I hear you asking. Taran Singh contacted me from Berkeley via an incredible story published by Liat Clarke in Wired, which also featured in Huffington Post. Taran is making a film about Charles and his wife Frances titled “Townes: Life in the Universe”.

YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/channel/UC61OcZJFLwdDLr2DkzQeX-g?feature=watch

“I want to collaborate because it is the right thing to do. I can collect compelling footage for my movie, advance Charles’ legacy, and make people aware of the enormous contribution to humanity he has made (and not just with the laser). Genome Laser is a creative and ambitious project and I am grateful to be a part of it.” - Taran Singh

Taran will be camping at Ooligan Alley (2&B) and is planning on capturing amazing footage of the Genome Laser in action at Aspire (aka Control Tower), an epic 60ft tall interactive structure complete with an enormous 60w laser, being constructed by the International Arts Megacrew.

Dr Jonathan Rothberg, who developed high-speed genome sequencing, moved it to a “chip” and can sequence a person in a few hours now with new machines, was on board when the project was just a wild idea. I’m proud that Genome Laser project is bringing together two of the most pioneering scientists in their respective fields of genomics and lasers (among others!), whose contributions towards medicine are continuing to find new applications and improve millions of lives.

Huge thanks to the awesome people behind Aspire (Control Tower) for supporting this project: in particular Diarmaid “Irish” Horken, Beave Beaverstock, and Matthew “Skippy” Raffery who is the legendary laser guy behind UV99 Laser which supplies most of the biggest laser shows at Burning Man, such as Ooligan Alley and Opulent Temple. Aspire will be located at Aspire Village, which is a combination of camps including IDEATE and Playa Skool. The Space Conference, and TEDxBlackRockCity which has an appropriate theme “paradigm shifts”, will also be hosted at Aspire Village.

Finally, behind the scenes the Genome Laser tech team has been crushing it thanks to Vincent Rebers, Michael Raasch, Neil Mendoza and Tom Bull. More technical updates are due very soon - meanwhile I strongly encourage fearless software developers and laser hackers to check out the latest build of QLT_GenomeLaser (Quality Laser Time) on Github.

Ahoy!
Alex Housley (aka Fastly)

Charles Townes’ accomplishments (aside from inventing the laser and winning a Nobel Prize):

• Chairman of the Science and Technology Advisory Committee (STAC) of the Apollo lunar landings. Played a key role in landing man on the moon by gathering scientists critical of the Kennedy’s effort to go the moon and getting their support
• Discovered the first polyatomic molecules in space ie. H20 (water) NH4 (ammonia). Today this field is still bearing fruit with the discoveries of more complex molecules in gas and dust clouds, some of which are precursors to life
• Figured out there is a black hole at the center of our Milky Way Galaxy- Now we know black holes play an important role in spiral galaxies
• Infrared Interferometry- a difficult and important technique that Townes’ group has pioneered for the last twenty years, allowing us to study the shapes and sizes of stars never before possible. From this research we have learned that Betelgeuse, the second most studied star in the sky, has shrunk 1% per year over the last 15 years
• Initiation of the search for extraterrestrial intelligence using lasers. This program is called Optical SETI and runs out of UC Berkeley, and may be our best hope of finding aliens
• Advisor to Popes and Presidents. Lifetime member of the Pontifical Academy of the Sciences, a group of 80 scientists that advise the Pope
• Founded JASON, the elite group of scientists advising the US military