The future for our computers will literally be at the speed of light. Extremely short light pulses can perform ultrafast logical operations: these are the findings of a study recently published in the journal Nature Photonics. The study represents an important step toward developing a new generation of information processing technologies, potentially hundreds of times faster than what we have at present.

Today’s computers rely on the movement of electrical charges inside transistors; however, these can only achieve a maximum frequency whose physical limits are hard to overcome. Unlike traditional electronics, based on the movement of electric charges, this innovative approach manipulates the state of electrons in matter by the use of oscillating light.

As Giulio Cerullo of the Politecnico di Milano explained, “We have shown that light can be used not only to transmit information, but also to process it. With the use of ultra-short laser pulses, we can control the quantum states of matter on time scales of a few millionths of a billionth of a second, i.e. at the same frequencies as light oscillations, speeds previously unknown in electronics.” These operations are performed at rates above 10 terahertz, over a hundred times faster than the best modern electronic devices.