Researchers from the United States have confirmed that a new twist on a classic material could advance quantum computing.
The research team at Penn State University highlighted that the new approach could make modern data centers more energy efficient.
Researchers worked on Barium titanate, first discovered in 1941, that is known for its powerful electro-optic properties in bulk, or three-dimensional crystals.
Significant achievement
“It has one of the largest electro-optic property values known in its bulk, single crystal form at room temperature. But when it comes to commercialization, it never made the leap,” said Venkat Gopalan, Penn State professor of materials science and engineering and co-author of the study .
“What we have done is show that when you take this classic material and strain it in just the right way, it can do things no one thought possible.”
Electro-optic materials like barium titanate act as bridges between electricity and light, converting signals carried by electrons into signals carried by photons, or particles of light.
Newly formed material improves the conversion of signal-carrying electrons
Despite its promise, barium titanate never became the industry standard for electro-optic devices, such as modulators, switches and sensors. Instead, lithium niobate — which is more stable and easier to fabricate, even if its properties don’t quite measure up with those of barium titanate — filled that role instead. But by reshaping barium titanate into ultrathin strained thin films, this could change
The research team highlighted that the newly formed material improves the conversion of signal-carrying electrons into signal-carrying photons by over ten times what has been shown at cryogenic temperatures.
Cryogenic operation is necessary for quantum technologies based on superconducting circuit. However, the delivery of information between distant quantum computers requires the conversion of that information into light, where traditional fiber-optics at room temperature could be used to enable true quantum networks, according to researchers.
Efficient electrical-to-optical transducers can also find use in data centers that support everything from artificial intelligence (AI) to online services.
These facilities consume vast amounts of energy, much of it to stay cool, a problem that optical links can help mitigate These facilities consume vast amounts of energy, much of it to stay cool. Because photons are particles of light, they can carry information without generating the kind of heat that moving electrons through wires does, making them far more energy efficient, according to a press release.
“Integrated photonic technologies as a whole are becoming increasingly attractive to companies that use large data centers to process and communicate large data volumes, especially with the accelerating adoption of AI tools,” said Aiden Ross, co-lead author of the study and graduate research assistant at Penn State.
“The basic idea is that we could send information throughout these centers using photons rather than electrons, letting us send many streams of information in parallel, and do so without having to worry about our electronics heating up, the sheer infrastructure needed to keep such centers cool and so on.”
Barium titanate thin films show large linear electro-optic coefficients in the tetragonal phase at room temperature, which is severely degraded down to ≈200 pm V−1 in the rhombohedral phase at cryogenic temperatures. There is immense interest in manipulating these phase transformations and retaining superior electro-optic properties down to liquid helium temperature, according to the study published in Advanced Materials.