The U.S. Office of Naval Research recently asked scientists and gadget-makers to send in their ideas for projects that will “form the foundation” for tomorrow’s “Counter Directed Energy Weapons (CDEW)” as the Navy begins to prepare for the threat of Directed Energy Weapons to surface ships.

The Pentagon's efforts to develop a beam weapon that can deter an adversary by causing a burning sensation on their skin has taken a step forward with the development of a small, potentially hand-held, version. The weapon, which is claimed to cause no permanent harm, could also end up being used by police to control civilians.

Despite concerns over legal and safety issues, the Pentagon is moving ahead with the Active Denial System or "Pain Ray" by seeking to upgrade it so that it can be fired from an aircraft.

High-energy laser weapons have been hailed as the future of anti-missile defence, but they may be further from being battle-ready than military chiefs hoped. In recent tests, several prototypes have suffered serious damage to their optics at intensities well below the expected levels of tolerance. There are also big problems managing the waste heat generated by high-intensity beams.

Electromagnetic pulse weapons capable of frying the electronics in civil airliners can be built using information and components freely available on the internet, according to counterterrorism experts. All it would take to bring a plane down would be a single but highly energetic microwave radio pulse blasted from a device inside a plane, or on the ground and trained at an aircraft coming in to land.

In recent test-blasts, Pentagon-researchers at Northrop Grumman managed to get its 105 kilowatts of power out of their laser -- past the "100kW threshold [that] has been viewed traditionally as a proof of principle for 'weapons grade' power levels for high-energy lasers."

Astrophysicists in the U.S. are repurposing technology used to detect and destroy ballistic missiles to combat mosquitoes. The technology works by detecting detects the audio frequency created by the beating of mosquito wings and then zapping it with a laser beam.

Air Force researchers are worried about a terror group using small drones to spy on -- or even attack -- U.S. forces. So the military boffins are testing out high-powered microwave blasts, to knock the small robo-planes out of the sky.

The Airborne Laser (ABL) was fired from a stationary plane at a target on the ground just a few metres away, marking a milestone for the weapon which planners hope can be used for patrolling the skies, zapping missiles, aircraft or even satellites in low Earth orbit with invisible, ultrapowerful laser beams.

A team of scientists from the U.S. and China announced that they had found a means of selectively and safely erasing memories in mice, an advance the military is interested in for treating post-traumatic stress disorder and possibly creating an 'amnesia ray' weapon.