Light a Fire
If you're wondering where basic research funding for things like cancer and diabetes has gone, look no further than scary, would have caused the Soviets to drool with envy, weapons projects like this:
MOODY AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. - The military calls its new weapon an "active denial system," but that's an understatement. It's a ray gun that shoots a beam that makes people feel as if they are about to catch fire.
...
During the first media demonstration of the weapon Wednesday, airmen fired beams from a large dish antenna mounted atop a Humvee at people pretending to be rioters and acting out other scenarios that U.S. troops might encounter in war zones.
The device's two-man crew located their targets through powerful lenses and fired beams from more than 500 yards away. That is nearly 17 times the range of existing non-lethal weapons, such as rubber bullets.
Anyone hit by the beam immediately jumped out of its path because of the sudden blast of heat throughout the body. While the 130-degree heat was not painful, it was intense enough to make the participants think their clothes were about to ignite.
"This is one of the key technologies for the future," said Marine Col. Kirk Hymes, director of the non-lethal weapons program at Quantico, Va., which helped develop the new weapon. "Non-lethal weapons are important for the escalation of force, especially in the environments our forces are operating in."
...
The weapon could be mounted aboard ships, airplanes and helicopters, and routinely used for security or anti-terrorism operations.

Prediction: this will, at some point, be used on American citizens.