1960–1970 · Americas · Technology
Lasers and low-loss optical fibers made it possible to control and transmit light with extraordinary precision for communication, measurement, surgery and manufacturing.
Atlas dossier · Cold War & DecolonizationFree device narration · synchronized English captions · transcript available
Why it matters
Lasers and low-loss optical fibers made it possible to control and transmit light with extraordinary precision for communication, measurement, surgery and manufacturing.
Theodore Maiman · Charles Kao · engineers · surgeons · telecommunications workers
Photonics enabled the high-capacity networks and precision instruments that now support the digital economy and modern medicine.
Interpretation note
This dossier distinguishes the event’s basic chronology from later arguments about meaning, responsibility and legacy. When comparing religious, national, Indigenous or scholarly interpretations, consult the primary and institutional sources above alongside peer-reviewed historical work.
Elsewhere in the world
1957 · AfricaGhanaian independenceGhana became the first sub-Saharan African colony to gain independence from European rule in the twentieth-century wave.
1957–1990 · GlobalSpace age and Earth observationSatellites, probes and orbital observatories made new forms of navigation, communication, weather forecasting and global environmental observation possible.
1963–1968 · GlobalPlate tectonics and Earth-system scienceEvidence from seafloor mapping, magnetism, earthquakes and continental movement established plate tectonics as the unifying framework for understanding Earth’s dynamic surface.