The Laser Unprinter 168
MrSeb writes "You've heard of laser printers — and now a team of researchers from the University of Cambridge in England has created a laser unprinter that can remove ink without damaging the paper. Despite both methods using lasers, their (un)printing approaches are fundamentally very different. In a laser printer, a laser is used to give individual 'pixels' on a piece of paper a positive charge (a separate heat source is used to fuse toner). In the laser unprinter, picosecond pulses of green laser light are used to vaporize the toner, or ablate in scientific terms. The primary goal of unprinting is to cut down on the carbon footprint of the paper and printing industries. Manufacturing paper is incredibly messy business, with a huge carbon footprint. Recycling paper is a good step in the right direction, but it still pales in comparison to unprinting. In a worst-case scenario, The University of Cambridge unprinting method has half the carbon emissions of recycling; best-case, unprinting is almost 20 times as efficient."
Money (Score:4, Funny)
Unprint $1 bills, print $100's
Re:Fraud (Score:4, Funny)
You can already modify stuff in Photoshop to change things
Except that you must scan in and then print back out your the document, in which signatures would instantly be detected as fraudulent.
the cost would be expensive even if they become mainstream
Like computing power and capacity (and laser printers, for that matter) are as expensive as they were 20 years ago?
only groups that would need one would be offices that have a laser printer
ROTFLMAO.
*hands in 20 stapled blank pages* (Score:4, Funny)
Professor, I totally had my paper finished but I accidentally unprinted it!
Re:Fraud (Score:5, Funny)
Just stop using paper! Just as soon as a simple 8.5x11 epaper-pads is available at the right price that has wifi and nfc I'm going to either get fired or get those deployed. Paper is a horrible waste as is maintaining printers and storing the crap and all of that. We use paper for trivial bullshit that then gets thrown away. Paper and printing are costing us 12 million over the last 10 years though costs have decreased some it's leveled off and my prediction is it will cost 9 million for the next ten. I want us weened off paper for the trivial bullshit NOW. Hell I could by sixty thousand of the damn things for 150 each with 9 million. Several 'paper is god' dinosaurs will by gone soon so I may have a shot. Dunno.
I don’t believe you, continue.
Signed - Dwight Schrute
Re:Ablation (Score:5, Funny)
Now they need a charged drum that collects the vaporized toner and puts it in cartridges....
Re:Fraud (Score:4, Funny)
Just stop using paper! Just as soon as a simple 8.5x11 epaper-pads is available at the right price that has wifi and nfc I'm going to either get fired or get those deployed. Paper is a horrible waste as is maintaining printers and storing the crap and all of that. We use paper for trivial bullshit that then gets thrown away. Paper and printing are costing us 12 million over the last 10 years though costs have decreased some it's leveled off and my prediction is it will cost 9 million for the next ten. I want us weened off paper for the trivial bullshit NOW. Hell I could by sixty thousand of the damn things for 150 each with 9 million. Several 'paper is god' dinosaurs will by gone soon so I may have a shot. Dunno.
I truly believe 2012 will be the year of the paperless office. That and the Linux Desktop.
In other news at some point we DID get the year of the Linux(ish) Mobile.