IBM turns electrical pulses into light

IBM has claimed a key breakthrough in optoelectronics with the development of an electro-optic modulator, 100 to 1,000 times smaller than previous modulators, which can translate electric pulses into light.

By translating electric pulses into light, the silicon Mach-Zehnder electro-optic modulator transforms electrons into photons.

The development is a significant step towards using light instead of electricity as a means of communication.

Light communication technology is expected to be much faster than electronic communication technology and had the advantage of not generating heat.

Electricity generates waste heat as a function of resistance, resulting in the need to cool computers down.

IBM’s electro-optic modulator is connected to a laser beam, and opens a shutter at precise intervals to encode information.

IBM estimates that using pulses of light to send information between computing cores can be 100 times faster than sending the information down a wire, and also uses 10 times less power.

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