Programmable Optical Logic Gates for All-Optical Processing

Luna Innovations proposes to demonstrate a simple all-optical processor by developing programmable optical logic gates based on the highly integrated photonic switch platform developed during the Phase I. These logic gates, once developed, can be assembled according to the principles of digital electronic design to construct a binary processor that performs functions such as add, subtract, increment, decrement, NAND, OR, XOR, etc. During the Phase I, Luna Innovations and its partner overcame significant hurdles to demonstrate the viability of a highly integrated photonic switch through electromagnetic modeling and by successfully patterning the device on the necessary scale (photonic lattice constants smaller than the wavelength of light) for true monolithic integration. Because of the novelty of the approach, the photonic switch is capable of integration several orders of magnitude more dense than any other known optical platform. This dense packaging capability is an essential enabler for practical optical computing. Luna will leverage this success and experience for the Phase II to design the proposed optical logic gates. Luna's partner will concentrate on the fabrication of the structures using the processing parameters developed during the Phase I while in parallel optimizing a nanoimprinting process that will support volume manufacturing of the devices.