Centre's vision of future is clear cut
By Kay Barney Imagine a transparent computer the size of a sugar cube, with millions of connections and components created by light - just virtual circuitry with no wires or boards. Research by Professors Allan Snyder and John Mitchell at the ANU's Centre for the Mind is paving the way for optical computers to become a reality. Their research was published this week in the prestigious journal Physical Review Letters. Centre Director and 1997 Australia Prize winner, Prof Snyder, said optical computers are tomorrow's technology, needed to meet the needs of the Information Superhighway. Light beams are better than electronics for computing and communications because they travel faster, have no mass and suffer less from the effects of interference. They can even pass through each other without distortion. In the paper, Profs Snyder and Mitchell describe the behaviour of light waves called "solitons" - the building blocks of technology required to make light guide light. Their paper builds on a breakthrough by a Princeton group which proved a theory advanced by Profs Snyder and Mitchell in 1991 - that light guiding light could be achieved using an ordinary light bulb. Previously it was only achieved with high-powered lasers. "We have taken this a step further in providing a general and simple explanation for how solitons will behave when they are created by a light bulb," Prof Snyder said. Solitons, which Prof Snyder calls the "ultimate surfer's wave", go on and on without losing shape or form. Normally waves spread as they travel and optical fibres are used to contain light beams. But solitons create their own channels and do not need optical fibres to guide them. Understanding the physics behind the solitons will help focus research in the field and establish a framework within which applied researchers and engineers can conceive experimental designs. But will this research lead to a viable technology? Professor Snyder likens the current situation to the mid-1960s when people were asking why it was necessary to do research into optical fibre technology. The existence of today's fibre optic communications technology is testimony to that research. "Light controls its own destiny," Prof Snyder said. The question remains whether we can harness it to control ours.