December 13, 2012

A portion of an IBM nanophotonic chip. In blue the optical waveguides transmitting high-speed optical signals and in yellow the copper wires carrying high-speed electrical signals (Image courtesy International Business Machines Corporation. All rights reserved)

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IBM announced that a significant step forward in what is called silicon nanophotonics, which the integration of optical communications with common silicon chips. This technology uses light pulses instead of electrical signals for communications and provides a kind of highway to transport large volumes of data between silicon chips.