The chips will be using optical interconnects

Apr 16, 2008 07:47 GMT  ·  By

Modern processor architectures allow semiconductor manufacturer to reach extremely high speeds, ranging from 3 to 5 Gigahertz. However, since no one can complain of too much horsepower, and the existing applications can suck your processor dry, researchers have already started their quest for terahertz chips.

According to a group of researchers at the University of Utah, computers with 30 to 40 GHz of horsepower are possible, just as Intel's Pat Gelsinger predicted back in 2001. Ajay Nahata, a University of Utah professor of electrical and computer engineering, claims that higher frequency speeds are possible if chip designers could implement optical technologies to replace the copper interconnects.

Nahata also claims that such computers could become commercially available within about 10 years, as optical technology would dramatically decrease the energy requirements and the enormous amounts of heat dissipated by terahertz processors.

The group of scientists based their prediction on circuits that replace conventional electricity with far-infrared light, also known as terahertz radiation. The group's research will be published in the online journal Optics Express issue, that is expected to arrive on April 18.

Nahata's test setup is comprised of stainless steel foil sheets with patterns of perforations, able to substitute for waveguides similar to a wired infrastructure. This setup can transmit, bend, split or combine terahertz radiation, and could account for circuits that run faster than the ones manufactured on the existing technology.

Although the project did not manage to acquire the much-hyped 1 THz speed, it was tuned into the terahertz radiation frequency (0.1 THz to 10 THz). According to the researchers, they managed to achieve and measure 0.3 THz frequencies (300 GHz speeds).

"Electronic circuits today work at gigahertz frequencies - billions of cycles per second," Nahata stated. "In this study, we've demonstrated the first step toward making circuits that use terahertz radiation and ultimately might work at terahertz speeds or a thousand times faster than today's gigahertz-speed computers."