Molecules of Light

Check this out. Some Rostok scientists have discovered how to create a "Molecule" of Light using something called a Soliton.

www.physorg.com...

Fiber optical systems transmit information by sending light signals through a fiber as a combination of zeros (dark) and ones (light). The data transfer rate for binary coding is fast approaching its fundamental limits, but it may be possible to bypass the limit by transmitting information as zeros, ones, and twos with soliton molecules representing the number two.

I had no idea such a feat was possible. Will we be able to somehow apply this method to other particles?

That's really amazing !

Possibly making Digital communication obsolete.

Well, from the following site with a quick search, it just seems to me like a re-statement of the wave-particle duality nature of light.

www.ciscopress.com...

Maybe I'm just misreading....

?? I thought it was an announcment for a new process of trasmitting information via fiber optics as a way to get around some limits by adding an extra stream of information. Higher data compression rates natually leads to increased download speeds.

The molecules are built of temporal solitons, pulses of light that do not dissipate or easily lose their shape like most other types of pulses. Solitons are useful for transmitting information because the signals can travel over long distances without degrading

The data transfer rate for binary coding is fast approaching its fundamental limits, but it may be possible to bypass the limit by transmitting information as zeros, ones, and twos with soliton molecules representing the number two.

the mysterious binary "two". sounds like that mysterious third dimension that Dr. Jonathon Frink talks about in the Simpsons.

it kinda sounds like they're exploiting the wave-particle duality somehow. could it be useful for quantum computing? transporting entangled states and such?
how are they going to use the 'two' in a binary (one and zero) system, that's what i'd like to know.

Perhaps they are. The article just seems to me to be re-stating wave-particle duality in some "new and fascinating" way. I most certainly could be wrong, though.

Binary is the basis of all computer technology. Adding another "unit" would essentually be trinary (ternary, tertiary or "trits"). Before we start transmitting trinary signals, we better think about compatibility with existing binary systems. Who or what is going to read it, and how will it translate it to the great volume of existing binary equipment? It can translate, but no faster than the slowest of the two modes.

I'm reminded of the dawn of computer design wars, when the Soviet Bloc attempted a trinary system. It didn't work. Although that design was a "one-zero-negative one" type of system.

Ahnikin's link to Ciscopress.com , excellent.... Apparently solitons are a naturally occuring transmission packet in fiberoptics. The critical portions of that article, are that solitrons do not travel at the same speed and strength, as that of light traveling in a wave form. Although solitrons would perform well over long distances along with photons, the particles would not have the same attenuation and time dispersion of the wave form. The signal lacks strength, and goes out of phase. Single mode fiberoptics compensates for that loss of attenuation and time dispersion, in order to gain distance.

As a result, solitron fiberoptic systems would be probably be limited to a single type of fiberoptics. Every path expected to use it would have to be of that type. Most long range fiberoptics are already of that single mode type.

What I see is the improbability of handling the solitrons themselves. The transmitter and receiver would both have to identify the solitrons as an exception, rather than a normal event. Combined with the problem of handling the noise of any naturally occuring solitrons that would have to be identified and filtered out.
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Thank you for the explanation ZPE When we eventually max out on current Computer technology would you agree that a Trinary system would be the next logical step. I know not now but say in 20 years?

[edit on 13-10-2005 by sardion2000]

Ah, I understand moreso now if this is where you're going with this:


www.cs.caltech.edu...


Quantum computers....nuff said

Well from what I understand of QC's is that they have four states 0,1,2,3 or something like that. This could just be a technicle stepping stone towards a QC.

My understanding of quantum computers was that the bits if I'm allowed to use that term, were either 1, 0 or both.

Bring on molecular computers!!!

from llama009
My understanding of quantum computers was that the bits if I'm allowed to use that term, were either 1, 0 or both.

yeah, I think you could say that, in that quantum computers will still be "digital" computers, but the bits or qubits as they're called, have a position of 1, 0 and what's called a"supra" position that can be either one or zero. This is where the entangled state comes in to play. What I was thinking was, that the solitons could be used to somehow transmit the "supra" bit, or entangled state. If the solitons exhibit an explicit structure or characteristics of mass, then maybe they could be modulated in some way.

I don't have time atm to hunt for links and such, but I'll attempt to itf

from ahnikah
Quantum computers....nuff said

I'm sorry, I'm not to fluent in emoticon. Could you expand a little on that thought, please?

Did you read the link I posted above?

I can try and find you others if you like.

Did you read the link I posted above?

yes. What I was asking was what you thought. 'Nuff said good or 'nuff said bad?

www.math.h.kyoto-u.ac.jp...
en.wikipedia.org...
en.wikipedia.org...
en.wikipedia.org...
en.wikipedia.org...

'Nuff said?

What I think is that this is a re-stating of a relatively old idea.
That being the idea of "quantum computers" and "qubits"....at least that's what the article points to to me.
I could be wrong, though...it's tough to admit, but it is a possibility

Originally posted by sardion2000
Well from what I understand of QC's is that they have four states 0,1,2,3 or something like that. This could just be a technicle stepping stone towards a QC.

The number of states is a function of the number of qubits you have. In a classical computer a three bit register only has one value. In a Quantum Computer, the three qubits are in all 8 possible states simultaneously.

By the time you get to a Qunatum Computer with 300 bits, it contains more states than there are atoms in the universe.

Originally posted by glastonaut

Originally posted by sardion2000
Well from what I understand of QC's is that they have four states 0,1,2,3 or something like that. This could just be a technicle stepping stone towards a QC.

The number of states is a function of the number of qubits you have. In a classical computer a three bit register only has one value. In a Quantum Computer, the three qubits are in all 8 possible states simultaneously.

By the time you get to a Qunatum Computer with 300 bits, it contains more states than there are atoms in the universe.

Do you have any links to review? Mine seem a little on the weak side...

Originally posted by ahnikah
Do you have any links to review? Mine seem a little on the weak side...

In the UK, Oxford have an excellent research site. Their FAQ is great, especially the "parallel universes" section. Check their tutorials too.

Centre for Quantum Computation

I got the "300 bits" example from the Wikipedia link given by fingapointa.

Originally posted by glastonaut

Originally posted by ahnikah
Do you have any links to review? Mine seem a little on the weak side...

In the UK, Oxford have an excellent research site. Their FAQ is great, especially the "parallel universes" section. Check their tutorials too.

Centre for Quantum Computation

I got the "300 bits" example from the Wikipedia link given by fingapointa.

Thank you, I will check those out.

sardion2000, it's hard to say what's next on the horizon. If we compare our computers to steam engines, the future will be about as unbelievable as possible. Some MIT research suggests that the human brain works in trinary.
And MIT is THE source for computing research.

The Center for Biological & Computational Learning
cbcl.mit.edu...
Brain circuitry findings could shape computer design
cbcl.mit.edu...

Which caused me to search out and drill down through the MIT data:
Next Generation Computing
alumweb.mit.edu...
MIT Laboratory for Computer Science
www.csail.mit.edu...
Research Activities
www.csail.mit.edu...

and I found Amorpous Computing:

Project on Mathematics and Computations
www.swiss.csail.mit.edu...
Amorpous Computing
www.swiss.csail.mit.edu...

So it appears the next step might be bio-engineered computing, and it just might be a trinary data form. I suppose that if we ever hope to have a real artificial intelligence, this would have to be the path to persue. But until then, everything remains centered on the binary we have now.

That was fun, I learned something today. But what I really want to know, is why holographic crystalline optical data storage disappeared from the news. I thought that was cool.
physicsweb.org...