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{{Short description|Device that switches or amplifies optical signals}}
An '''optical transistor''', also known as an '''optical switch''' or a
The fastest demonstrated all-optical switching signal is 900 [[attosecond]]s (attosecond =10^-18 second), which paves the way to develop ultrafast optical transistors.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Hui |first1=Dandan |last2=Alqattan |first2=Husain |last3=Zhang |first3=Simin |last4=Pervak |first4=Vladimir |last5=Chowdhury |first5=Enam |last6=Hassan |first6=Mohammed Th. |date=2023-02-24 |title=Ultrafast optical switching and data encoding on synthesized light fields |journal=Science Advances |language=en |volume=9 |issue=8 |pages=eadf1015 |doi=10.1126/sciadv.adf1015 |issn=2375-2548 |pmc=9946343 |pmid=36812316|bibcode=2023SciA....9F1015H }}</ref>
Since [[photons]] inherently do not interact with each other, an optical transistor must employ an operating medium to mediate interactions. This is done without converting optical to electronic signals as an intermediate step. Implementations using a variety of operating mediums have been proposed and experimentally demonstrated. However, their ability to compete with modern electronics is currently limited.
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== Comparison with electronics ==
The most commonly argued case for optical logic is that optical transistor switching times can be much faster than in conventional electronic transistors. This is due to the fact that the speed of light in an optical medium is typically much faster than the [[drift velocity]] of electrons in semiconductors.
Optical transistors can be directly linked to [[Optical fiber cable|fiber-optic cables]] whereas electronics requires coupling via [[photodetectors]] and [[LEDs]] or [[lasers]]. The more natural integration of all-optical signal processors with fiber-optics would reduce the complexity and delay in the routing and other processing of signals in optical communication networks.
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== Implementations ==
Several schemes have been proposed to implement all-optical transistors. In many cases, a [[proof of concept]] has been experimentally demonstrated. Among the designs are those based on:
* [[electromagnetically induced transparency]]
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* [[nanowire]]-based cavities employing polaritonic interactions for optical switching<ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1038/nnano.2012.144| title = All-optical active switching in individual semiconductor nanowires| journal = Nature Nanotechnology| volume = 7| issue = 10| pages = 640–5| year = 2012| last1 = Piccione | first1 = B. | last2 = Cho | first2 = C. H. | last3 = Van Vugt | first3 = L. K. | last4 = Agarwal | first4 = R. | pmid=22941404| bibcode = 2012NatNa...7..640P}}</ref>
* silicon microrings placed in the path of an optical signal. Gate photons heat the silicon microring causing a shift in the optical resonant frequency, leading to a change in transparency at a given frequency of the optical supply.<ref>{{Cite book | doi = 10.1364/FIO.2012.FW6C.6| chapter = A Silicon Optical Transistor| title = Frontiers in Optics 2012/Laser Science XXVIII| pages = FW6C.FW66| year = 2012| last1 = Varghese | first1 = L. T. | last2 = Fan | first2 = L. | last3 = Wang | first3 = J. | last4 = Gan | first4 = F. | last5 = Wang | first5 = X. | last6 = Wirth | first6 = J. | last7 = Niu | first7 = B. | last8 = Tansarawiput | first8 = C. | last9 = Xuan | first9 = Y. | last10 = Weiner | first10 = A. M. | last11 = Qi | first11 = M. | journal = Frontiers in Optics. Annual Meeting of the Optical Society of America| volume = 2012| pmid = 28133636| pmc = 5269724| isbn = 978-1-55752-956-5}}</ref>
* a dual-mirror optical cavity that holds around 20,000 [[cesium]] atoms trapped by means of [[optical tweezers]] and laser-cooled to a few [[microkelvin]]. The cesium ensemble did not interact with light and was thus transparent. The length of a round trip between the cavity mirrors equaled an integer multiple of the wavelength of the incident light source, allowing the cavity to transmit the source light. Photons from the gate light field entered the cavity from the side, where each photon interacted with an additional "control" light field, changing a single atom's state to be resonant with the cavity optical field, which changing the field's resonance wavelength and blocking transmission of the source field, thereby "switching" the "device". While the changed atom remains unidentified, [[quantum interference]] allows the gate photon to be retrieved from the cesium. A single gate photon could redirect a source field containing up to two photons before the retrieval of the gate photon was impeded, above the critical threshold for a positive gain.<ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1126/science.1242905| pmid = 23950521| title = Triggering an Optical Transistor with One Photon| journal = Science| volume = 341| issue = 6147| pages = 725–6| year = 2013| last1 = Volz | first1 = J.| last2 = Rauschenbeutel | first2 = A.| bibcode = 2013Sci...341..725V| s2cid = 35684657}}</ref>
* in a concentrated water solution containing iodide anions<ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1063/5.0130236| title = An ultra-fast liquid switch for terahertz radiation| journal = APL Photonics| volume = 7| issue = 121302| year = 2022| last1 = Buchmann | first1 = A.| last2 = Hoberg | first2 = C.| last3 = Novelli | first3 = F.| page = 121302| bibcode = 2022APLP....7l1302B| doi-access = free}}</ref>
* Modification of the dielectric material reflectivity to demonstrate attosecond "petahertz" optical switching.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hui |first=Dandan |last2=Alqattan |first2=Husain |last3=Zhang |first3=Simin |last4=Pervak |first4=Vladimir |last5=Chowdhury |first5=Enam |last6=Hassan |first6=Mohammed Th. |date=2023-02-22 |title=Ultrafast optical switching and data encoding on synthesized light fields |url=https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/sciadv.adf1015 |journal=Science Advances |volume=9 |issue=8 |pages=eadf1015 |doi=10.1126/sciadv.adf1015 |pmc=9946343 |pmid=36812316}}</ref><ref>{{Cite patent|number=US20240219301A1|title=Optical switching and information coding on femtosecond or sub-femtosecond time scale|gdate=2024-07-04|invent1=Mohammed|invent2=HUI|invent3=ALQATTAN|inventor1-first=Mohammed Tharwat Hassan|inventor2-first=Dandan|inventor3-first=Husain|url=https://patents.google.com/patent/US20240219301A1/en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hassan |first=Mohammed Th. |date=2024-02-21 |title=Lightwave Electronics: Attosecond Optical Switching |url=https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsphotonics.3c01584 |journal=ACS Photonics |volume=11 |issue=2 |pages=334–338 |doi=10.1021/acsphotonics.3c01584|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
* Demonstration the Petahertz Optical Transistor (POT) by light-induced quantum current generation in graphene transistor<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Sennary |first=Mohamed |last2=Shah |first2=Jalil |last3=Yuan |first3=Mingrui |last4=Mahjoub |first4=Ahmed |last5=Pervak |first5=Vladimir |last6=Golubev |first6=Nikolay V. |last7=Hassan |first7=Mohammed Th |date=2025-05-09 |title=Light-induced quantum tunnelling current in graphene |url=https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-59675-5 |journal=Nature Communications |language=en |volume=16 |issue=1 |pages=4335 |doi=10.1038/s41467-025-59675-5 |issn=2041-1723|arxiv=2407.16810 }}</ref>
== See also ==
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