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An experimental investigation was made of the effect of high-power laser radiation on water drops of ~10–2 cm size. The drops disintegrated under the action of such radiation. The disintegration was of explosive nature and was attributed to boiling of strongly overheated water at isolated hot spots, which formed as a result of an inhomogeneous distribution of the optical field in a drop.
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Barinov et al. (1973) studied this question.
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