Scores of laser specialists from across Iran took part in the congress, which was held in Tehran on Thursday, to exchange views and discuss latest achievements in the field of laser technology in the country. Iran has been one of the world's leading countries in publishing scientific articles on laser over the past couple of years. “In 2010, at the international Dubai congress, Iran came first among 52 countries in terms of the number of scientific articles submitted to the congress.” said Reza Fekr-Azad, president of the laser conference. “Moreover, despite the sanctions imposed against Iran, Iranian physicists have managed to produce laser equipment,” he added. Ali Javan is a prominent Iranian physicist in the area of laser science who invented the world's first gas laser in the early 1960s. In 2011, Iranian scientists at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) designed and built a nuclear fusion device, which has placed the Islamic Republic among a handful of countries with such technology. The device, which is a nuclear fusion reactor, is used for enriching uranium for civilian purposes. It employs Inertial Electrostatic Confinement method and can produce isotopes and radioisotopes used in diagnosing and curing cancer. Iran is the sixth country after the US, Japan, South Korea, Australia and France which has mastered such know-how in the world.