Soon, weapons that can inflict 'pain beams' on criminals

London, Dec 25 (ANI): Futuristic weapons that inflict pain from a distance using beams of laser light are soon going to become a part of reality, thanks to the US Department of Justice.

According to a report in New Scientist, the research arm of the US Department of Justice is working on two portable non-lethal weapons that inflict pain from a distance using beams of laser light or microwaves, with the intention of putting them into the hands of police to subdue suspects.

The two devices, under development by the civilian National Institute of Justice (NIJ), both build on knowledge gained from the Pentagon's controversial Active Denial System (ADS), which uses a 2-metre beam of short microwaves to heat up the outer layer of a person's skin and cause pain.

Like the ADS, the new portable devices will also heat the skin, but will have beams only a few centimeters across.

They are designed to elicit what the Pentagon calls a "repel response" - a strong urge to escape from the beam.

A spokesperson for the National Institute for Justice has likened the effect of the new devices to that of "blunt trauma" weapons such as rubber bullets.

"But unlike blunt trauma devices, the injury should not be present. This research is looking to reduce the injuries to suspects," he said.

The NIJ's laser weapon has been dubbed Personnel Halting and Stimulation Response - PHaSR - and resembles a bulky rifle.

It was created in 2005 by a US air force agency to temporarily dazzle enemies, but the addition of a second, infrared laser makes it able to heat skin too.

The NIJ is testing the PHaSR in various scenarios, which may include prison situations as well as law enforcement.

According to a spokesperson for the NIJ, a tabletop prototype with a range of less than a meter, a backpack-sized prototype with a range of 15 meters will be ready next year.

The effect of microwave beams on humans has been investigated for years, but there is little publicly available research on the effects of PHaSR-type lasers on humans.

The attraction of using a laser is that it can be less bulky than a microwave device. (ANI)