United States Patent
US Patent 7791781: Rapidly reconfigurable all-optical universal…
US 7791781 · granted 2010-09-07
Abstract
A new reconfigurable cascadable all-optical on-chip device is presented. The gate operates by combining the Vernier effect with a novel effect, the gain-index lever, to help shift the dominant lasing mode from a mode where the laser light is output at one facet to a mode where it is output at the other facet. Since the laser remains above threshold, the speed of the gate for logic operations as well as for reprogramming the function of the gate is primarily limited to the small signal optical modulation speed of the laser, which can be on the order of up to about tens of GHz. The gate can be rapidly and repeatedly reprogrammed to perform any of the basic digital logic operations by using an appropriate analog optical or electrical signal at the gate selection port. Other all-optical functionality includes wavelength conversion, signal duplication, threshold switching, analog to digital conversion, digital to analog conversion, signal routing, and environment sensing. Since each gate can perform different operations, the functionality of such a cascaded circuit grows exponentially.
| Patent Number | 7791781 |
|---|---|
| Title | Rapidly reconfigurable all-optical universal logic gate |
| Filed | 2007-05-21 |
| Granted | 2010-09-07 |
| Inventor(s) | Goddard; Lynford L., Bond; Tiziana C., Kallman; Jeffrey S. |
| Assignee | Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC |
| CPC Classification | G02F 3/00 |
| Number of Claims | 84 |
Abstract
A new reconfigurable cascadable all-optical on-chip device is presented. The gate operates by combining the Vernier effect with a novel effect, the gain-index lever, to help shift the dominant lasing mode from a mode where the laser light is output at one facet to a mode where it is output at the other facet. Since the laser remains above threshold, the speed of the gate for logic operations as well as for reprogramming the function of the gate is primarily limited to the small signal optical modulation speed of the laser, which can be on the order of up to about tens of GHz. The gate can be rapidly and repeatedly reprogrammed to perform any of the basic digital logic operations by using an appropriate analog optical or electrical signal at the gate selection port. Other all-optical functionality includes wavelength conversion, signal duplication, threshold switching, analog to digital conversion, digital to analog conversion, signal routing, and environment sensing. Since each gate can perform different operations, the functionality of such a cascaded circuit grows exponentially.
Claim 1
An optical apparatus, comprising: a plurality of optical output facets that defines an optical cavity; plurality of N cascaded predetermined optical structuresdisposed therein said optical cavity and configured to provide a gain index lever for said apparatus; and a control section also disposed therein said optical cavity and configured to receive a gate selection signal and at least one input signal so asto actuate said gain index lever so that a predetermined wavelength shift can be produced to alternate one or more optical signals through desired said optical output facets.
Claims
84 totalAn optical apparatus, comprising: a plurality of optical output facets that defines an optical cavity; plurality of N cascaded predetermined optical structuresdisposed therein said optical cavity and configured to provide a gain index lever for said apparatus; and a control section also disposed therein said optical cavity and configured to receive a gate selection signal and at least one input signal so asto actuate said gain index lever so that a predetermined wavelength shift can be produced to alternate one or more optical signals through desired said optical output facets.