Have you heard of the word “attosecond”? Frankly, this is first time to me. Of course my educational background let me have learnt those like “millisecond”, “microsecond” and even “nanosecond” but not the word “attosecond”. This word simply means it’s one billion-billionth of a second. It’ really an extremely tiny fraction of a second. Something that lasts for an attosecond means something just like never happened. As it stayed that overly tiny fraction of time as if it never happened or existed.
What’s related to this word? It’s about the research currently carried out by University of Bath, which they’re developing the technology that’s able to send out light pulses that last only a attosecond. What’s so cool about this technology, for having light pulses that last in such an extremely short period? It could be the key to making computers that run on light. Which means a computer that is extremely fast, to convery information at light speed. If you’ve got some physics background, you’ll know how fast light travels. It takes only 8.9 seconds for light to travel from sun to the earth.
The research is aiming on finding ways to manipulate light waveforms into different shapes, and expanding the area known as “photonics”. Which means once light is under human’s manipulation and control, then we can make of light to usefully convey information for us. Currently, they’re able to create lightwaves in a conventional sine form. The hope is to create waves that are square or triangular, which have far greater value for communication within a computer. If this research was successful, it could change human’s computer history.
March 18th, 2007 at 9:27 am
Now this is breakthrough stuff. I am going to bookmark it.