IBM reports breakthrough in the field of nanophotonics on cmos chip

IBM has succeeded in building a chip with both optical components and electronic circuits. A standard cmos process at 90nm was used for this. IBM calls its silicon nanophotonics technology a breakthrough.

IBM has been developing the technology for more than a decade and in 2010 showed a so-called proof-of-concept of the technology. Company has however, has now demonstrated for the first time that the integration of optical components and electronic circuits on a chip is actually practically feasible and that its production can be carried out by a regular chip factory. “This breakthrough enables us to use the technology in a real production environment and this development will have an impact across a range of applications,” said John E. Kelly, head of IBM Research.

IBM’s technology uses optical channels and signal processing logic that can be placed on a chip along with the CMOS logic. According to IBM, this makes it possible to produce optical communication chips by chip factories in a conventional manner. This would result in significant cost savings compared to traditional methods for optical interconnects.

The company has demonstrated optical transceivers based on its silicon nanophotonics technology with a throughput of 25Gbps per channel. In addition, the technology is capable of transmitting multiple optical data streams in parallel through a single fiber optic cable using the integrated hardware for wavelength multiplexing.

IBM plans to use the technology for so-called ‘big data’ applications. The company is presenting its findings this week at the IEEE International Electron Devices Meeting.