There are new ideas and innovative concepts that can improve the laser and the target configurations alike.

FORBES: The Global Race For Fusion Power

Energy is delivered from the laser to the target, causing its outer layer to explode, which drives the inner substance of the target inwards, compressing it massively.

FORBES: U.K. And U.S. Join Forces on Laser-Fusion Energy

People who target aircraft with laser pointers will be treated "extremely seriously", police have warned.

BBC: Green laser

Also, she says, determine how much income you need to stay afloat each month, and focus on that target like a laser.

CNN: Should you launch your own consultant business?

Air Force F-15E fighter jets will launch the new weapon, which would find its target either by a laser or satellite guidance system.

CNN: Pentagon to use new bomb on Afghan caves

It just became possible, thanks to a laser camera developed by physicists at Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh, UK. You can pretty much see how it works from the images above -- laser beams are bounced off the target and the duration of their return journey is measured precisely enough to detect millimeter depth changes even at extreme distances.

ENGADGET: Laser scans objects in 3D from half a mile away, scientists just need reason to use it

Two problems that have dogged laser weapon development for some time are weather conditions and the target itself.

BBC: Anti-aircraft laser unveiled at Farnborough Airshow

Laser guiding has reduced the number of bombs required to destroy a target, from 500 in Vietnam to 15 in the first Iraq war to one in the current conflict.

FORBES: Magazine Article

To ensure the weapon hits the target, the system can be guided by GPS, inertially, or by laser designation.

FORBES: Raytheon's New Collateral Damage Minimizing Munition

It operates by focusing a laser pulse in the air to create a high energy plasma ball (up to several kilometers away) at a target.

FORBES: Ray Guns Beam from H.G. Wells to Kickstarter and Beyond