Optical device achieves slowest light propagation

The ability to control light pulses on an integrated chip-based platform is a major step toward the realisation of all-optical quantum communication networks, with potentially vast improvements in ultra-low-power performance.

Holger Schmidt, professor of electrical engineering in the Baskin School of Engineering at the University of California (UC), Santa Cruz, led the team of researchers at UC Santa Cruz and Brigham Young University that developed the new device.

‘Slow light and other quantum coherence effects have been known for quite a while, but in order to use them in practical applications we have to be able to implement them on a platform that can be mass produced and will work at room temperature or higher, and that’s what our chips accomplish,’ said Schmidt.

Optical fibres transmit data at light speed but routing and data processing operations still require converting light signals to electronic signals. An all-optical data processing system will require compact, reliable devices that can slow, store and process light pulses.