While computer chips are getting smaller and faster every year, one challenge remains unsolved: combining electronics and photonics on a single chip. Although components such as micro LEDs are available as individual chips and waveguides as tiny fibre optic cables, the materials required are too different for a harmonised chip. A new type of etching process could now be the decisive breakthrough for combining light sources and optical fibres. In the OptoGaN project, researchers from the TU Braunschweig and the Friedrich Schiller University Jena are therefore working on porous gallium nitride. In the QuantumFrontiers Cluster of Excellence, the Topical Groups "TrapFab" and "Structured Illumination at the Nanoscale" will particulary benefit from the new research project.
The press release of TU Braunschweig: https://magazin.tu-braunschweig.de/en/pi-post/integrated-light-as-a-key-to-future-computers/
