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Lasers are commonly used as heating implements but for the first time, a team of researchers has now used an infrared laser to cool liquid by about 20 degrees Celsius.

The study is led by Paden Roder of the University of Washington. It has been published n the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"This is the first example of a laser beam that will refrigerate liquids like water under everyday conditions," said senior author Peter Pauzauskie. "It was really an open question as to whether this could be done because normally water warms when illuminated. The real challenge of the project was building an instrument and devising a method capable of determining the temperature of these nanocrystals using signatures of the same light that was used to trap them," explained Roder. "There's a lot of interest in how cells divide and how molecules and enzymes function, and it's never been possible before to refrigerate them to study their properties," said Pauzauskie. "Using laser cooling, it may be possible to prepare slow-motion movies of life in action. And the advantage is that you don't have to cool the entire cell, which could kill it or change its behaviour."

This could be used to create higher-power manufacturing lasers, which aren't possible with the current technology because lasers tend to overheat and melt. But first, the researchers have to work on refining the process, starting with improving its efficiency and in its current form; it uses a lot of energy.

"Few people have thought about how they could use this technology to solve problems because using lasers to refrigerate liquids hasn't been possible before," Pauzauskie said. "We are interested in the ideas other scientists or businesses might have for how this might impact their basic research or bottom line."