First Room-Temperature Germanium Laser Completed 80
eldavojohn writes "MIT researchers have built and demonstrated the first room-temperature germanium laser that can produce light at wavelengths suited for communication. This achievement has two parts: '[U]nlike the materials typically used in lasers, germanium is easy to incorporate into existing processes for manufacturing silicon chips. So the result could prove an important step toward computers that move data — and maybe even perform calculations — using light instead of electricity. But more fundamentally, the researchers have shown that, contrary to prior belief, a class of materials called indirect-band-gap semiconductors can yield practical lasers.' While these are only the initial steps in what may become optical computing devices, the article paints it as very promising. The painful details will be published in the journal Optics Letters."
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You miss the point.
At last, we can lase about in a comfortable, shirtsleeves environment.
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Think of the potential band-width of full spectrum fibre-optics.
In a comfortable, shirtsleeves environment of course.
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This thread is starting to sound like an infomercial.
Throw away that bulky refrigeration equipment!
Say goodbye to those messy liquid nitrogen dewars!
No more trekking down to crowded laboratories!
You can enjoy wide-bandwidth germanium laser technology in the privacy of your own home!
(Cut to testimonial): I really enjoy having my own home germanium laser set-up. I used to schlep down to the lab five times a week, and as often as not all the equipment was in use. Now I keep my room temperature germanium lase
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Now, at last, I too can download 15 bibles per second, in the privacy of my own home?
Praise the Lord!
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Re:Fill us in, please? (Score:4, Informative)
Why is this better than existing solid-state lasers?
-jcr
Already being integrated with silicon for circuits [wikipedia.org]. And like the summary says, manufacturing is much easier.
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Manufacturing is easier, provided you first have a stable supply of the element. In the future, rare earth elements will dominate the high tech economy. China is the world's largest producer.
Basically, instead of the middle east having us by the short hairs, in the future it's going to be the Chinese.
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instead of the middle east having us by the short hairs, in the future it's going to be the Chinese.
In the future?
Re:Fill us in, please? (Score:5, Funny)
Stronger, faster, more efficient.
Downside is it has a tendency to encroach on polandium lasers...
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You meant polonium, right?
Who's Whooshing Who? (Score:2)
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No, he meant bolognium, whose atomic weight is deliciously snacktacular.
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and also Francium (element #87)
Re:Fill us in, please? (Score:4, Funny)
Only the Vichi isotope is conducive to interactions with germanium, the rest react violently.
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And I thought it was only suitable for popping giant balls of popcorn.
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Stronger, faster, more efficient.
On the other hand, it has no wireless and not as much space as a Nomad.
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Stronger, faster, more efficient.
Downside is it has a tendency to encroach on polandium lasers...
Wow, Godwin's Law didn't waste any time kicking in here.
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Is it too much to ask to read the summary?
I'm on a schedule here. I don't have time to read the summary AND post comments! So which sort is this thing, another Australian contraction of freedoms or a NYCL recap of RIAA legal manouvers?
Re:Fill us in, please? (Score:5, Informative)
lasers compatible with silicon processing technology are a good thing. SiGe is a proven IC material set with a sort-of robust processing knowledgebase. Incorporating Germanium optics into silicon designs supposedly will usher in a new era of wacky computing with on-chip optical logic elements, interconnects, etc. Some people think quantum computing would be easier if you were working in the optical instead of electrical domain. Blah blah. People made silicon lase not too long ago, but efficiency was horrible. Germanium can make for a much better optics, and now you can put in together.
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Silicon has a 0.7v drop across a pn junction, whereas germanium only drops 0.3v. I would imagine that being able to use much lower operating voltage has some benefits.
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Sharks aren't allergic to germanium, so it's safer and cheaper to mount this laser on their heads, because you don't need so much shielding. This reduced shielding also makes it easier for the shark to aim the laser, easier to swim [less drag], and more environmentally friendly.
Ah Yes... (Score:1, Funny)
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Make mine from Ruritanium (Score:5, Funny)
Shouldn't Berlin University be the one using the Germanium?
MIT should have made their laser out of Americium.
And it sucks to be Cambridge. There is no such thing as Englandium.
What? No, I don't have anything sensible to say about this story. And anyway, at first I thought it said geranium, and my comment was going to be even stupider than this one.
Re:Make mine from Ruritanium (Score:5, Funny)
And it sucks to be Cambridge. There is no such thing as Englandium.
England could use noble gases, perhaps?
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I would not want to be in that lab when the laser fires.
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Yeah, I was going to go with something about space nazis but then I thought, oh whatever.
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You could always say that a germanium laser is great because it doesn't require electricity, it runs without any juice...
Re:Make mine from Ruritanium (Score:4, Insightful)
It does suck for the English, they could use Europium but the best I could find was Rhodium, meaning rose. The next best is Rutherfordium for Ernest Rutherford as he was a British citizen but was born a New Zealander.
Hell even Ytterby a Swedish village has two elements named after it (Ytterbium and Yttrium).
A few more but by no means an exhaustive list.
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Actually, Ytterby has four elements named after it: Ytterbium, Yttrium, Terbium and Erbium.
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That's because we're not nationalistic (Score:2)
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Also Yttrium and Ytterbium.
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And it sucks to be Cambridge. There is no such thing as Englandium.
I know. And the atomic symbol "Uk" is available too.
CAm (Score:2)
In Cambridge they just have to use a dielemental approach which mixes carbon and americium.
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> And it sucks to be Cambridge. There is no such thing as Englandium.
They can use Britannium.
I'll be impressed when (Score:2)
they invent a geranium laser. Green laser power in your window.
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I'll be impressed because they'll need coherent geraniums. (er... geranii?)
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gerania.
Geranium Laser? (Score:2)
Cool! And I guess all you need to power it is plenty of sunlight, water and the occasional packet of Baby Bio.
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and the occasional packet of Baby Bio
A diaper?
ET (Score:2)
In this case, (Score:2)
ah yes, photonic computing (Score:3, Interesting)
they were talking about photons supplanting electrons in the '80s. and it was supposed to be imminent, right around the corner
AI, tablet computers, rocket cars, fusion power, natural speech computing:
eternally 10 years away
wake me up when it actually happens
yes, it would be (Score:4, Interesting)
it would be cool. it would have no resistance. and it would be faster
so no heat sink problems, it would run at much lower power levels, and optical computing would make today's fastest electronic computers look like a texas instruments calculator from the 1970s
additionally, since we're running fibre everywhere today, there's no real interface/ translation between the photon on the line and the photon going into the processor, ideally. the promise is that the internet would become this woven intelligent network, soaring into the stratosphere in terms of speed, interconnectivity, intelligent routing, etc. it would really open up some amazing barely imaginable implications and avenues in terms of what the internet could possibly do. or maybe it would just mean 10^100 spams per picosecond ;-P
assuming of course they tackle the bazillion fabrication issues facing the cheap, easy production of photonic computers. we're a long way away, but i hope to see a rudimentary setup before i kick the bucket
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uhm.. no photonic transistors yet?
from wikipedia: "A completely optical computer requires that one light beam can turn another on and off. This was first achieved with the photonic transistor, invented in 1989 at the Rocky Mountain Research Center"
of course, it could be some vandalism or something..
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Yes, Sleeping Beauty.
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AI, tablet computers, rocket cars, fusion power, natural speech computing
One of these does not belong with the others.
Now we need room temperature sharks (Score:2)
Now we need room temperature sharks
er, but... (Score:2)
Er, but there's a very good reason Germanium is not used much as a semiconductor.
It has very high leakage at room temp, and the leakage goes up exponentially from there.
By the time you get up to 50C it's basically a poor resistor instead of a semiconductor.
So this really is a "room temperature laser", in the sense that you have to cool it to room temperature.
Communication wavelength (Score:1, Insightful)
Oh dear. So many replies, so much nonsense. Slashdot these days...
This is a great achievement.
What is great about this laser is that they seem to have found a new
material system that emits at communication wavelength. Communication
wavelength are important because this is a wavelength you can couple well
into optical fibers.
What they seem to do is they apply tensile strain to a germanium layer and
basically push it's energy bands from indirect semiconductor to direct
semiconductor. Direct semiconductors can amp
Ge (Score:1, Funny)
you know the Germans always make good stuff.
gegen ein totes Pferd (Score:3, Funny)
bedeutet das wir endlich diesen verdammten Haie mit Lasern auf dem Kopf?