No, it's not your memory, it is true.
I remember TV programme, mentioning those numbers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrB
I remember hearing or reading somewhere about how much light is reflected back to earth by the prism placed on the moon. From memory the laser on earth is in the high kilo or low mega Watts, the reflected beam is measured in pico Watts.
Or it could just be my dodgy memory.
But, no it's not likely.
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I think there is no such thing as perfectly collimated laser beam.
However, dispersion occurs even in this case and if I remember correctly, the distance to the point at which inverse square law applies is the function of beam diameter among other parameters (just like the resolution of telescope depends on objective diameter).