Researchers at Trinity College Dublin have developed a new light-based technology on a tiny chip that could help make the data centres behind cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and global internet services faster and more efficient. In the new research, recently published in leading international journal Nature Communications, the Trinity team reported one such promising advance with collaborators at the University of Bath and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL). 

The team developed a new way to generate extremely stable signals of light using microscopic ring-shaped devices called “microresonators”. These signals form what scientists call optical frequency combs, sometimes described as “optical rulers” because they produce a series of evenly spaced colours of light that can be used to measure light with remarkable precision.

The researchers also demonstrated a new type of light pulse called a “hyperparametric soliton”. This stable pulse is the key behind the major advancement in this work, as it allows the comb signals to be produced at different colours of light from the laser that powers the device. 

This makes the technology useful for high-speed optical communications that play a major role in data transfer (in data centres). And the researchers demonstrated this in a wavelength region used for high-speed data links inside large data centres, an area of growing importance as demand for data continues to surge with the expansion of AI computing infrastructure.