No, masers are not just a word that we came up with just now. They’ve actually been around since the 1950s, before lasers were invented. The problem is that they’ve always been impractical–that is, until the team of researchers came up with a device that could let masers over take lasers in the coolness race.
They have yet to determine what the maser can do, but like the laser the discoveries only happen when you shoot stuff.
The expectation is that the more precise maser can shoot through clouds (lasers can’t), detect extra-terrestrials, and turn into a surgical tool that can exactly attack a tumor.
From the August cover of Nature magazine:
The maser is the microwave-frequency precursor of the now ubiquitous laser. But it has had little technological impact compared with the laser, in large part because of inconvenience: masers typically require vacuum and/or low-temperature operating conditions.
Some researchers think they’ve solved that problem and have published a paper in Nature magazine, Room-temperature solid-state maser.
The preceding link gives the abstract. For more details read-on at: