Light-Powered Super-Fast Computers To Arrive By 2025

“The challenge is to find a single material that can effectively use and control light to carry information around a computer. Much like how the web uses light to deliver information, we want to use light to both deliver and process computer data," said project leader Dr Richard Curry, of Surrey’s Advanced Technology Institute.  "This could transform the computers of tomorrow, allowing them to effectively process information at much faster speeds."

A huge breakthrough in ion doping has allowed the researchers, in collaboration with the University of Cambridge and the University of Southampton, the ability to use light to transfer information and process applications, rather than electrons.

Currently, information is passed around the world via fiber-optic cable; data travels at the speed of light.  When it hits your computer, it is slowed down dramatically because conventional computers work by passing electrons around instead of light.

Now, by changing the properties of a common glass, amorphous chalcogenides, found in CDs and DVDs, they are able to "act as a light source, a light guide and a light detector – something that can carry and interpret optical information."

The technology has eluded scientists for decades, but since the recent discovery it is already being implemented into a new type of computer memory called CRAM.  It is expected that optical computers will be fully active within ten years.

http://anonhq.com/light-powered-super-fast-computers-to-arrive-by-2025/

http://www.surrey.ac.uk/features/new-research-lights-way-super-fast-computers