A new frontier awaits — computing with light

Story by Kathryn Hulick in Science News Explores

Today’s tech computes with electricity. But light shows promise as a new means of number-crunching. Could the future of computers be even brighter?

Read the full story in Science News Explores.

This silicon wafer will be cut into separate chips. These chips will sit at the center of an optical quantum computer. Tiny components on these wafers produce, guide and detect single photons of light. (Courtesy PsiQuantum)

A new frontier awaits — computing with light

Researchers explore optics as a path to next-gen number-crunching

Francesca Parmigiani of Microsoft Research helped design a new type of computer, the analog optical computer. It uses light to solve some kinds of problems. Here, she poses with an early version of the machine. (Chris Welsch for Microsoft)

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“You can actually put your hand inside the computer to block the light. [When you do that], it doesn't know what problem it's solving, it's just taking random guesses.” - Hitesh Ballani, computer scientist, Microsoft Research