“WE DID an experiment the other day that turned gold into mercury,” says Ken Ledingham, a laser specialist at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, UK. The achievement might not have impressed medieval alchemists, whose goal was precisely the reverse – turning base metals into gold. But it could still be the start of a revolution. Using lasers to transmute elements means that within a few years scientists could be doing alchemy on their desktops, with huge implications for applications as diverse as medicine and nuclear power.
The alchemists of old never got close to creating gold. Their experiments were mere…
