How can problems with miniaturization of electronics be avoided with light or photon circuits?
The creation of more and more advanced technology around the indomitable mindset of controlling human nature. At first he learns the use of different energies, such as the discovery of fire. Then it is the turn of the various forces of nature to be transformed into other forces as needed, such as steam-powered vehicles, finally at the beginning of the twentieth century man successfully mastered the science of controlling nature and became involved in the game of subduing nature. From the acquisition of nuclear energy to test tube babies, DNA-Engineering is the best example of this in medicine. We use such technology in our daily life without realizing it. How? If you think about it, you can understand that every electronic device, television, mobile phone, camera, tablet, computer, laptop, etc. that you have been using all the time, there is a skillful attempt to control nature using science everywhere.
But you know, beyond the limitations of these electronic devices, new technology may be coming to the market very soon. More dynamic, compact, light, and affordable, because the battery costs a lot less! Yes, that technology is called 'photonics'. But before that, we need to know well what are the shortcomings of electronic technology of today and what is the solution or how is it possible [1-4]?
How do electronic devices work? What are its shortcomings?
‘Electronics’ or ‘electro-particle science’ is a branch or science of physics where the use of various instruments or devices to control the flow of electricity or electrons through appropriate means is discussed to its advantage [5]. Instruments can be gas tubes, transistors, or microchips. The medium can be electrolytic gas, semiconductor / semiconductor material such as silicon etc. Signs of unprecedented expertise in electronics are the sleek smart phone in our hands, or the neatly shaped laptop on the desk.
The computer runs on electricity. He is not as sensitive or emotional as we are. He only understands the fluctuations in the voltage across the transistors on his motherboard. If the voltage is given less, then zero (0) and more (usually 5 volts) means one (1). Any work, from complex mathematical calculations, from rocket launches to playing games or chatting, watching movies, everything is either in a combination of these ‘0’s’ and ‘1’s’. Why just computers, any device in electronics, from mobile phones to today's digital television, all work this way. This ‘0’ or ‘1’ is called a ‘bit’. A hen mathematical branch made up of only two numbers, ‘0’ and ‘1’ is called a ‘binary system’ which is used in digital electronics. Electronic devices consist of tiny (often smaller than viruses or bacteria [8], only a few nanometers (1069) in size) ‘switches’ or transistors that control the amount of current flowing in the internal circuit and the direction we need it (Figure 1). Through the keypad from the outside, we actually control the voltage of the circuit by turning these switches on (off) or off (off). There are millions of such switches or transistors in today's advanced computers, which we can turn on or off in an instant with the help of external programs. The speed of the computer depends largely on how fast these switches can be switched on or off, in a word, on the ‘clock-speed’ of the computer.
For example, the speed of these clocks on our computer is usually Giga (109) Hz, which means that the controlling switches on this computer can be turned on and off about 109 times per second or more than a billion times. You can also see the clock-speed of your processor by going to ‘run’ of ‘windows’ and typing ‘dxdiag’. Understandably, the number of hundreds of millions per second is not small at all. But scientists do not want to stop at this and can not. This is because with the passing of time, the demand for information is increasing all over the world, which will soon become impossible for today's electronic computers to process [10].
So there is a constant effort to make these computers smaller, more dynamic and more efficient. Here's the problem! Miniaturization of electronic circuits cannot be done in a happy way. This is because whenever two electronic circuits come very close to each other, their ability to store electricity or charge increases manifold. This tendency to charge is called capacitance. They then trap electrons like pots around them. As a result, no matter how fast we try to control these switches from the outside, since the captured electrons cannot move easily, the speed of the computer also starts to decrease with miniaturization. So while Intel's co-founder Gordon Moore's famous 1975 prediction (Moore's law) that the density of transistors on a semiconductor chip will double every two years is more or less true, it is increasingly difficult to make the size of electronic transistors smaller. To solve this problem, we today resort to photonics, a branch of optics.
The spread of optics
Like electronics but the use of optics is also everywhere. From the measurement of the ultra-weak gravitational waves caused by the collision of two monstrous twin black holes at billions of light-years away [12] to the precise measurement of a fraction of a millionth of a second through the tiny atomic vibrations in an atomic clock. Surprisingly stem hollows, such as the work of smelting metal at high temperatures on the one hand, and reaching absolute zero temperatures on the other, are used in both cases. Today, courtesy of the mile-by-mile-long Optical Fiber Cable under the sea, we have high-speed broadband internet (Figure 2) in our home today, which is my constant companion for listening to your daily online lectures, YouTube videos or thriller series on Netflix [15, 16] ]. The glittering Pujo pendulum LED lights, the laser beams used in cataract surgery, or the once-favorite dusty CDs carelessly cherished on your desk, are all gifts of optics. However, optical science and photonics are not exactly the same. To know that in detail, it is necessary to have a thorough idea about the nature of the motion of light. In fact, photonics can be identified as a special branch of optics.
The nature of the speed of light
Light is a kind of wave or a combination of fast moving particles? In this century-long debate, the scientist Newton (particle) to Higgins (wave), Maxwell (wave) to Planck or Einstein (again particle!), No one was left out. Finally, later scientists de Broglie and others explained that the duality of whimsical light exists. He is sometimes wave-like, sometimes or particle-like. When light is reflected from any object, we see it. Reflection, refraction, and interference can be explained by the wavelength of light. Again, it is not easy to explain the photoelectric effect of light without thinking of it as a combination of small clusters of particles or photons. These light-particles or photons generally follow the formula of quantum mechanics, which is capable of explaining the properties of tiny particles. The word ‘photon’ is derived from the Greek word ‘fosো’ or ‘phot’ which means ‘light’. Think about it, photography is the work of light. Interestingly, Einstein himself, who proved the particles of light through the discovery of photoelectricity and was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1921, was a staunch opponent of the absurd and haunting laws of quantum mechanics until the last days of his life. Incidentally, optics, above all, is closely associated with the groundbreaking discoveries of optical-particle science, which we have discussed in detail later.
What is light-particle science or photonics? Why?
However, what is this 'photonics'? Photonics is a technology that can be used to create photons of different colors (energies) as needed, to control those fast-moving photons from the outside, and finally to collect and use those photons for various purposes. The solution to the problems of electronics circuits is hidden but here it is. Well, what if the same thing could be done by sending light or a bunch of photons instead of sending current or electrons into the circuit? Photons do not attract or repel each other. Therefore, noise is much less in optical circuits than in electronic circuits. Also, since the rest-month of the photon is zero (0), the photon, like the electron, is unable to accumulate in any position. As a result, the retention problem does not apply to light at all. These photonic computers have small lasers. If the laser is on, it means '1' and if it is off, it means '0'. In relentless research, scientists soon discovered optical transistors [16] or switches that control the movement of light and the on-off of lasers. This work can also be done through optical resonators An alternative to the thin copper wire is the so-called optical waveguide. Although they are about one hundred percent thinner than the thickness of human hair, they transmit light from one end of the circuit to the other without interruption. As can be seen, smaller computers can be made using photonic technology with a clock-speed of at least a few thousand times higher (1012 or tera-hertz) [3, 15, 16]. Photonic circuits also generate very little heat because the photons are mass and chargeless. Reduce energy wastage .
Photonics in information exchange or communication
So now it is understood why photonics is going to replace electronics inside computers. But the use of photonics to transfer information from one computer to another is already widespread. Fiber Optic: Internet cables encode information between extremely high-frequency (energy) photons or light and send it over the ocean floor (typically, wavelengths are about 1550 nanometers / frequency 193.55 terahertz) from one continent to another (Figure 2). ). What is the advantage of using light here? High frequency means huge data bandwidth. More bandwidth means more users at once; YouTube video without buffering! But the higher the frequency of the electronic wave or signal, the more energy is absorbed as it passes through the metal wire (enthusiastic readers can search for the ‘skin effect’ to see why this happens). As a result, metals that operate at higher frequencies of giga-hertz are not readily available, or even more expensive. Noise emitted from lightning or other natural / artificial sources also affects electronic signals. The effect of that noise is less in the light. Therefore, the use of photonics instead of electronics is profitable from all sides. (Continued)