Optical computing

Optical computing

Today's computers use the movement of electrons in-and-out of transistors to do logic. Optical or Photonic computing is intended to use photons or light particles, produced by lasers or diodes, in place of electrons. Compared to electrons, photons are much faster – light travels about 30 cm, or one foot, in a nanosecond – and have a higher bandwidth.

Most research projects focus on replacing current computer components with optical equivalents, resulting in an optical digital computer system processing binary data. This approach appears to offer the best short-term prospects for commercial optical computing, since optical components could be integrated into traditional computers to produce an optical/electronic hybrid. However, optoelectronic devices lose 30% of their energy converting electrons into photons and back. This also slows down transmission of messages. All-optical computers eliminate the need for optical-electrical-optical (OEO) conversions.[1]

Application-specific devices have been designed which use principles of optical computing, e.g., optical correlators. Such devices can be used for detecting and tracking objects, for example.[2]

Contents

Optical components for binary digital computer

The fundamental building block of modern electronic computers is the transistor. To replace electronic components with optical ones, an equivalent "optical transistor" is required. This is achieved using materials with a non-linear refractive index. In particular, materials exist[3] where the intensity of incoming light affects the intensity of the light transmitted through the material in a similar manner to the voltage response of an electronic transistor. Such an "optical transistor"[4][5] can be used to create optical logic gates,[5] which in turn are assembled into the higher level components of the computer's CPU. These will be non linear crystals used to manipulate light beams into controlling others.

Controversy

There are ongoing disagreements among researchers with regard to the future capabilities of optical computers: will they be able to compete with semiconductor-based electronic computers in terms of speed, power consumption, cost, and form factor? Opponents of the idea that optical computers can be competitive note that [6] real world logic systems require "logic-level restoration, cascadability, fan-out and input–output isolation", all of which are currently provided by electronic transistors at low cost, low power, and high speed. For optical logic to be competitive beyond a few niche applications, major breakthroughs in non-linear optical device technology would be required, or perhaps a paradigm shift in computing itself.

Misconceptions, challenges and prospects

A claimed advantage of optics is that it can reduce power consumption, but an optical communication system will typically use more power over short distances than an electronic one. This is because the shot noise of an optical communication channel is greater than the thermal noise of an electrical channel which, from information theory, means that more signal power is required to achieve the same data capacity. However, over longer distances and at greater data rates, the loss in electrical lines is sufficiently large that optical communications will comparatively use a lower amount of power. As communication data rates rise, this distance becomes longer and so the prospect of using optics in computing systems becomes more practical.[citation needed]

A significant challenge to optical computing is that computation is a nonlinear process in which multiple signals must interact to perform computations. Light, which is an electromagnetic wave, can only interact with another electromagnetic waves in the presence of electrons in a material[clarification needed], and the strength of this interaction is much weaker for electromagnetic waves such as light than for the electronic signals in a conventional computer. This results in the processing elements for an optical computer requiring more power and larger dimensions than those for a conventional electronic computer using transistors.[citation needed]

Photonic logic

Realization of a Photonic Controlled-NOT Gate for use in Quantum Computing

Photonic logic is the use of photons (light) in logic gates (NOT, AND, OR, NAND, NOR, XOR, XNOR). Switching is obtained using nonlinear optical effects when two or more signals are combined.[5]

Resonators are especially useful in photonic logic, since they allow a build-up of energy from constructive interference, thus enhancing optical nonlinear effects.

Other approaches currently being investigated include photonic logic at a molecular level, using photoluminescent chemicals. In a recent demonstration, Flood et al. performed logical operations using molecules and SERS.[7]

Further reading

Optical Implemnetation of Bounded non Deterministic Turing Machine, Patent by Shlomi Dolev and Yuval Nir Filed May 2003 in Israel, May 2004 USA;[8] Solving Hamiltonian, and other NP-Complete problems.[9]

References

  1. ^ Mind at Light Speed, David Nolte, page 34
  2. ^ Feitelson, Dror G. (1988). "Chapter 3: Optical Image and Signal Processing". Optical Computing: A Survey for Computer Scientists. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. ISBN 0262061120. 
  3. ^ http://www.rp-photonics.com/nonlinear_index.html
  4. ^ Jain, K. and Pratt, Jr., G. W., "Optical transistor", Appl. Phys. Lett., Vol. 28, 719 (1976).
  5. ^ a b c Jain, K. and Pratt, Jr., G. W., "Optical transistors and logic circuits embodying the same", U.S. Pat. 4,382,660, issued May 10, 1983.
  6. ^ R.S. Tucker, "The role of optics in computing", Nature Photonics, no.4, p. 405.
  7. ^ Witlicki, Edward H.; Johnsen, Carsten; Hansen, Stinne W.; Silverstein, Daniel W.; Bottomley, Vincent J.; Jeppesen, Jan O.; Wong, Eric W.; Jensen, Lasse et al. (2011). "Molecular Logic Gates Using Surface-Enhanced Raman-Scattered Light". J. Am. Chem. Soc. 133: 7288–7291. doi:10.1021/ja200992x. 
  8. ^ http://v3.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/originalDocument?CC=US&NR=2005013531&KC=&FT=E
  9. ^ http://www.springerlink.com/content/w614x0874x040227/

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