Beam may refer to:

Streams of particles or energy

Light beam A light beam or beam of light is a directional projection of light energy radiating from a light source. Sunlight forms a light beam (a sunbeam) when filtered through media such as clouds, foliage, or windows. To artificially produce a li ...

, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **

Laser beam A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word ''laser'' originated as an acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of rad ...

Radio beam In a radio antennas, the main lobe or main beam is the region of the radiation pattern containing the highest power or exhibiting the greatest field strength. The radiation pattern of most antennas shows a pattern of "'' lobes''" at various d ...

Particle beam A particle beam is a stream of charged particle, charged or neutral particles other than photons. In Particle accelerator, particle accelerators, these particles can move with a velocity close to the speed of light. There is a difference between ...

, a stream of charged or neutral particles **

Charged particle beam A charged particle beam is a spatially localized group of electrically charged particles that have approximately the same position, kinetic energy (resulting in the same velocity), and direction. The kinetic energies of the particles are much lar ...

, a spatially localized group of electrically charged particles ***

Cathode ray Cathode rays are streams of electrons observed in discharge tubes. If an evacuated glass tube is equipped with two electrodes and a voltage is applied, glass behind the positive electrode is observed to glow, due to electrons emitted from the c ...

, or electron beam or e-beam, streams of electrons observed in discharge tubes ***

X-ray An X-ray (also known in many languages as Röntgen radiation) is a form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength shorter than those of ultraviolet rays and longer than those of gamma rays. Roughly, X-rays have a wavelength ran ...

beam, a penetrating form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation **

Molecular beam A molecular beam is produced by allowing a gas at higher pressure to expand through a small orifice into a chamber at lower pressure to form a beam of particles (atoms, free radicals, molecules or ions) moving at approximately equal velocitie ...

, a beam of particles moving at approximately equal velocities

People

Beam (rapper) Tyshane Thompson (born 1995), known professionally as Beam (an acronym for Be Everything and More; stylised in all caps; formerly as Tyshane and Elite), is a Jamaican-born American rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He is the son ...

(born 1995), American hip hop artist * Anong Beam, Canadian Ojibwe artist and curator * Carl Beam (1943–2005), Indigenous Canadian artist

Arts, entertainment and media

Beam (music) In musical notation, a beam is a horizontal or diagonal line used to connect multiple consecutive Musical note, notes (and occasionally rests) to indicate rhythmic grouping. Only eighth notes (quavers) or note value, shorter can be beamed. The num ...

, a connection line in musical notation * ''Beam'' (single album), by Hoshi X Woozi, 2025 * ''The Beam'' (fairy tale), the Brothers Grimm tale 149 * BEAM.TV, an online digital delivery and content management platform * BEAM Channel 31, a Philippines television network *

Beam (website) Mixer was an American video game live streaming platform. The service launched on January 5, 2016, as Beam, under the ownership of co-founders Matthew Salsamendi and James Boehm. The service placed an emphasis on interactivity, with low stream la ...

, later Mixer, a former video game live streaming platform * BeamNG.drive, an open-world vehicle simulation video game * Beam, to transport matter using the Transporter in the ''Star Trek'' fictional universe

Businesses

Beam Software Krome Studios Melbourne, originally Beam Software, was an Australian video game development studio founded in 1980 by Alfred Milgrom and Naomi Besen and based in Melbourne, Australia. Initially formed to produce books and software to be publis ...

, later Krome Studios Melbourne, an Australian video game development studio * Broadcast Enterprises and Affiliated Media, a telecommunications company in the Philippines * Beam Energy, an energy provision arrangement of British company

Robin Hood Energy Robin Hood Energy was a not-for-profit energy company launched in September 2015 by Nottingham City Council as a competitor to the "big six" energy suppliers in the United Kingdom. The company supplied gas and electricity nationally to homes ...

Science and technology

BEAM (Erlang virtual machine) BEAM is the virtual machine at the core of the Erlang Open Telecom Platform (OTP). BEAM is part of the Erlang Run-Time System (ERTS), which compiles Erlang source code into bytecode, which is then executed on the BEAM. BEAM bytecode files have t ...

, a virtual machine at the core of the Erlang Open Telecom Platform *

BEAM robotics BEAM robotics (from biology, electronics, aesthetics and mechanics) is a style of robotics that primarily uses simple analogue circuits, such as comparators, instead of a microprocessor in order to produce an unusually simple design. While not a ...

(biology, electronics, aesthetics and mechanics), a style of robotics *

Beam search In computer science, beam search is a heuristic search algorithm that explores a graph by expanding the most promising node in a limited set. Beam search is a modification of best-first search that reduces its memory requirements. Best-first searc ...

, a heuristic search algorithm *

Bigelow Expandable Activity Module The Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) is an experimental inflatable space habitat, expandable International Space Station#Pressurised modules, space station module developed by Bigelow Aerospace, under contract to NASA, for testing as a ...

, an experimental expandable space station module *

Apache Beam Apache Beam is an open source unified programming model to define and execute data processing pipelines, including ETL, batch and stream (continuous) processing. Beam Pipelines are defined using one of the provided SDKs and executed in one of t ...

, a data processing programming model *

Beam (structure) A beam is a structural element that primarily resists loads applied laterally across the beam's axis (an element designed to carry a load pushing parallel to its axis would be a strut or column). Its mode of deflection is primarily by bending ...

, a structural element that resists lateral loads

Other uses

Beam (horse) Beam (1924 – 1941) was a British Thoroughbred racehorse and Horse breeding#Terminology, broodmare. As a juvenile she showed promise by winning one race and finishing third in the Molecomb Stakes. In the following year she finished fourth in ...

, a racehorse *

Beam (nautical) The beam of a ship is its width at its widest point. The maximum beam (BMAX) is the distance between planes passing through the outer sides of the ship, beam of the hull (BH) only includes permanently fixed parts of the hull, and beam at waterlin ...

, the width of a ship at its widest point *

Beam, Great Torrington Beam is an historic estate in the parish of Great Torrington, Devon, England. Beam House is situated about 1 1/2 miles north-west and downstream of that town, on the right-bank of the River Torridge. Both the Rolle Canal and the railway crossed ...

, an estate in Devon, England *

Balance beam The balance beam is a rectangular artistic gymnastics apparatus and an event performed using the apparatus. The apparatus and the event are sometimes simply called "beam". The English abbreviation for the event in gymnastics scoring is BB. The bal ...

, or beam, a piece of gymnastics equipment *

The Beam (geological outcrop) The Beam is a geological outcrop on US Route 2 in South Hero, Vermont that is well known for its display of small-scale thrust faults originating from the Taconic Orogeny. The Beam is frequently visited by geology students studying the geology of ...