In one way or another we all need our computers every generation to become faster and increase your capabilitiesThanks precisely to this advance in computing we have managed to reach the present day enjoying this impressive technological level.
Unfortunately today, following the path that we are going, we are reaching a point where physics already tells us that it is literally impossible, for example, to build more capable processors although, in addition to data storage, current computers have quite a significant bottleneck in the speed at which signals can be transmitted.
This research could translate into computers up to 100.000 times faster than today's.
This is precisely the point at which a group of researchers from the University of Michigan What have they achieved?Send signals in order of femtoseconds, an advance that could revolutionize the world of computing as we know it. To give you an idea, a femtosecond is the unit of time that is equivalent to one billionth of a second, that is, in a second there are one thousand trillion femtoseconds. As many fit in a second as seconds fit in 100 million years and 100 seconds fit in 3.153.600.000.000.000 million years.
In order to carry out this experiment, scientists have used gallium selenide crystals as semiconductor, a material with which they have then been able to make laser pulses of only a few femtoseconds in duration, when impacting against them, the electrons pass from one energy level to another which, in turn, caused the emission of even more pulses short. It is precisely these pulses that could be used to read and write information with electrons. To control all this flow of information it was only necessary to change the orientation of the crystals.
Further information: University of Michigan