Not only do we have to stand in long lines, take off our shoes, and travel with a ridiculously tiny amounts of liquid, but we also occasionally have to go through the intrusion and embarrassment of a full body pat-down or be scanned by machines that see us in our underwear. Fortunately, help is on the way. Scientists at Michigan State University have suggested that lasers could be used at security checkpoints to do scans faster and more efficiently.

Marcos Dantus, a chemistry professor at the university, has designed a bomb-detecting laser. The laser, which can detect even the tiniest amounts of bomb-making materials, uses a single laser beam with two pulses.