The ultra-small revolution has begun, thanks to scientists who claim to have developed a laser that can communicate in several wavelengths at once on a computer chip, boosting speed.
An international team, led by Professor David Moss of Sydney University, has developed a multiple wavelength laser on a silicon chip that produces light to process and transmit information, and in doing so will speed up computing.
“The on-chip light source will be a key to enabling the simultaneous transmission of multiple data channels either on-chip or between chips in a single optical fibre, each at a different wavelength.
“Currently information on a chip is shuffled around using electronic signals over copper wires, or interconnects. We know that metal is prone to ‘choking’ on the bandwidth bottleneck,” Prof Moss said.
In fact, according to him, using light for simultaneous multiple information processing is an important breakthrough.
The device, based on high index doped silica glass, is low loss and has a high degree of manufacturability and design flexibility.
And, this makes it an ideal integrated multiple wave length source not just to improve computing power, but for a wide range of applications including telecommunications, high- precision broadband sensing and spectroscopy, metrology, and even attosecond physics, say the scientists.
The findings have been published in the latest edition of the ‘Nature Photonics’ journal.
