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OPTICAL

COMPUTERS
Done By

What is Optical Computer


An optical computer is a computer that uses
photons in visible light or IR beams to perform
digital computation .

EXAMPLES
Consider E-mail

.txt
format

Electronic
To
Photonic
Converter

Fiber
optic
cables

Optical Computers perform computations,


operate, store and transmit data using only
light.
5

Why Optical Computers...?


In silicon computers, the speed of
computers was achieved by miniaturizing
electronic components.
It is also estimated that the number of
transistor switches that can be put onto a
chip doubles every 18 months.
So further miniaturization of size
introduces several problems such as

Advantages...
Increase in the speed of computation.
Immune to electromagnetic interference.
Free from electrical short circuits.
Have low-loss transmission and large bandwidth.
Speed of light in photonic circuits will be close to
speed of light in vacuum
Capable of communicating several channels in
parallel without interference.
Possesses superior storage density and
accessibility
No power loss due to excess of heating.
Life of the hardware of optical computer is more.

Parallel communication

Optical computation
Light in the place of Electron
Uses optical components
Transistors, logical gates etc. are
simulated using optics.
All-optical components require a high
level of laser power to function as
required.
Send pulses of light instead of pulses
of electricity

Optical Components...
VCSEL-vertical
cavity surface emitting laser
VCSEL
A vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) is a
semiconductor-based laser diode that emits a
highly efficient optical beam vertically from its top
surface.
VCSELs have high performance and low cost
advantages

Optical interconnection of circuit using


VCSEL and photodiodes
VCSEL converts the electrical signal to optical
using lens and micromirrors

Photonic Crystals Aphotonic crystalis a


periodicopticalnanostructurethat affects the
motion ofphotonsin much the same way that
ionic lattices affectelectronsin solids.
Photonic crystals are attractive optical
materials for controlling and manipulating light
flow.

SLM
Aspatiallightmodulator(SLM)isanobjectthat
imposessomeformofspatially
varyingmodulationonabeamoflight.
when the phrase SLM is used, it means
that the transparency can be controlled
by acomputer.

Spatiallightmodulators,playanimportantrolein
opticalprocessing,forinputtinginformationonlight

Logical Gates
Logic gates are the building blocks of any digital
system. An optical logic gate is a switch that
controls one light beam with another. It is "on"
when the device transmits light, and "off" when it
blocks the light.

Smart pixels -Smart pixels, the union of

optics and electronics

Expands the capabilities of electronic


systems and enables optical systems with
high levels of electronic signal processing.
Some examples include,
LED- Light emitting diode with FET- Field
effect transistor.

DRAWBACKS
Todays materials require much high power to
work in consumer products, coming up with the
right materials may take five years or more.
Optical computing using a coherent source is simple
to compute and understand, but it has many
drawbacks like any imperfections or dust on the optical
components will create unwanted interference pattern
due to scattering effects. Incoherent processing on the
other hand cannot store phase information .

CONCLUSION

Optical technology promises massive upgrades in the efficiency and


speed of computers, as well as significant shrinkage in their size and
cost.

Even though pure Optical computer has many challenges hybrid


opto-electrical computer can be expected very soon, and in near
future pure optical computer too..

Thank You

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