Every laptop computer, PDA or mobile phone contains a microprocessor in which millions of interconnected transistors perform complex logical functions. Optical circuits, in contrast, are still at the pre-integrated- circuit stage. The optical fibres that form the backbone of the Internet, for example, are mostly connected individually between sources and detectors. Direct optical signal routing, on the other hand, would provide a reconfigurable network that fulfils the requirements of today’s bandwidth-hungry applications, such as video-on-demand. Optical routing could even be used inside computers to connect the central processing unit to its peripherals.
Now researchers in the US have brought the dream of all-optical circuits a little closer. Raffaele Colombelli of Bell Labs and co-workers at the California Institute of Technology and Harvard University have developed a new type of light source by combining a quantum cascade laser with a photonic crystal (Science 302 1374).
The team used lithography to etch an array of holes in the semiconductor laser, which allowed the spectral and spatial properties of the output radiation to be controlled. The marriage of these two devices could form miniature chemical sensors for medical or environmental applications.
In the March issue of Physics World Jerome Faist at the Institute of Physics in the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland describes this work in more detail.
