Scientists from McMaster and Harvard University made a discovery that led to new discoveries in computing technology with light rays. Kalaichelvi Saravanamuttu, a scientist at McMaster University, explained that together with scientists from Harvard University, they created a type of hydrogel developed by light manipulation and measurement techniques. The results of the study that scientists from two universities carried out in the laboratories of Harvard University were published in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Translucent substance, similar to a gel, contains photosensitive molecules whose structure changes. The structure of the gel, which changes the structure of the light, enables the light rays to transmit information between them. Light rays typically expand as they move. However, in the developed gel substance, it acts as if the rays are passing through a pipe. The gel substance proceeds without expanding with the filaments that the rays of light will pass. Since multiple laser beams, each approximately half the diameter of a human hair, shine in the gel material in the same way, the researchers found that they determined each other’s density even if their optical fields did not overlap. Kalaichelvi Saravanamuttu, one of the researchers, said that the communication between the light filaments can be stopped, started, managed, predictable and readable. This structure of light filaments can be used as an information form that can be used in disabled data processing forms. Saravanamuttu states that even if the rays diverge, they can see each other and therefore change. “In the long term, we imagine that we can design computing processes using this smart sensitivity,” Saravanamuttu said. Derek Morim, a graduate student in the study and one of the authors of the article, says that although the concept of light computing is a separate and developing area on its own, this new technology is a promising platform. Morim said, “We may not only design photo-responding materials that change their optical, chemical and physical properties in the presence of light. We can also use it to create light channels that can direct light or to create self-compacting rays. ” Morim added that further work on the gel material may result in the design of even more complex materials that can manipulate both light and material in certain ways. Amos Meeks, a graduate student from Harvard University John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, said that the study can also be used to develop systems that control light with light.
