14 DAY TRIAL // A team of physicists at the US National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) announces the development of a new sensor that is capable of measuring the optical power passing through a fiber optics cable with unprecedented levels of accuracy.
The advanced radiometer, whose performances are mostly a direct result of using carbon nanotubes as the main light-absorbing material, can measure a power level of 10 nanowatts with an uncertainty level of just 0.1 percent.
The most remarkable thing about this new work is that it may finally allow the use of fiber optics in developing quantum computers. These machines will be the next generation of computers, and they will be capable of speed that today's machines cannot even dream to reach.
The new device “is also a step toward converting radiometry from a classical practice based on electrical units to a quantum practice based on single particles of light,” a NIST press release explains.