Storing Light In Chips

Roland Piquepaille writes "Recently, researchers have "stopped light" by storing light pulses in hot or extremely cold gases (check these former stories on Slashdot or at BBC News Online). Now, scientists from Stanford University have devised a method to store light pulses under ordinary conditions. In Light-storing chip charted, Technology Research News says this opens the way for all-optical communications switches, quantum computers and quantum communications devices. The researchers plan to demonstrate this technique by trapping microwave signals within a year. They think that a prototype which works at optical frequencies could be made in two to five years. This overview contains more details and references."

Comments

Schrodinger

[andy666]

This was predicted by Schrodinger in the 30's - it really took them a long time to do it.

Please tell me how this time it's different.

[Mysteray]

Keep in mind that this is only theoretical. The researchers plan to demonstrate this technique by trapping microwave signals within a year. They think that a prototype which works at optical frequencies could be made in two to five years.

Does this sound like another one of those "breakthroughs" in optical/quantum computation where prototypes are "just around the corner" and commercialization is "just a few years away", yet it never happens?

Tell me how this time it's different. Does it work on standard fab processes?

I would really love a CPU with a terahertz clock. I guess it would still be I/O bound, though.