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An artist's illustration of an optical switch, splitting light pulses based on their energies.
New Optical Switch Could Lead to Ultrafast All-Optical Signal Processing

07-30-22

One of the major limitations of optics-based systems at present is that, at a certain point, they still need to have electronics-based transistors to efficiently process the data. Now, a team led by Alireza Marandi, Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering and Applied Physics, has created an all-optical switch. Such a switch could eventually enable data processing using photons. Device nanofabrication was performed at the Kavli Nanoscience Institute (KNI) at Caltech. [Caltech story]

Tags: research highlights KNI Alireza Marandi Rajveer Nehra Saman Jahani Luis Ledezma Arkadev Roy Qiushi Guo Ryoto Sekine Robert Gray

Illustration of soliton formation
A New Soliton Offers a Path Toward Compact Molecular Sensing

04-11-22

Scientists know that molecules in our exhaled breath can reveal a vast amount of medical information; for example, sensors to precisely measure minute changes in the concentrations of different vapors in breath may one day replace the standard blood test.” However, no technology is yet available to access this data from exhaled breath in a timely, affordable way. A new process for generating self-reinforcing wave pulses, also known as solitons, may pave the way toward bringing optical molecular sensing out of the lab and into medical devices with a compact footprint. 

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Tags: EE Alireza Marandi Rajveer Nehra Saman Jahani Luis Ledezma Arkadev Roy