Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
1–10 of 39 posts
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#2Hi,
I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture).
Ask me anything.
[15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#3Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
You're changing the world for the better.
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#4Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
How large is your proof of concept implementation? Do you think the architecture could be miniaturised enough to make a whole processor?
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#5Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
Fantastic work. Some off-hand questions, total noob in your field but interested in it and reading a lot:
- how fast is it (4KHz mentioned seems a bit slow, or is that a function of size?)?
- how far away from practical applications do you think you are?
- is the optical circuitry limited by the interaction with the electronic parts?
- the paper is already two years old, have there been interesting developments since then (in your lab, or elsewhere)?
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#6Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
What is the perceived potential in silicon photonic relative to traditional silicon in terms of:
* energy efficiency
* circuit density
* switching speed
* manufacturing cost
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#7Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
Could you foresee fully photonic hardware at some point so not just silicon but motherboards, graphics cards and even external interconnects?
Is it possible to build RAM and SSDs in optical circuits yet? I ask because this has very interesting military uses that could push this forward if you could have devices impervious to electro-magnetic pulses.
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#8Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
How is the optical switching power needs being addressed?
Last I heard, you needed a high-powered laser on a non-linear material to turn transmission of a separate light signal on/off. Is that how things still work?
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#9Hi, I'm the author of this paper [15] cited in OP's publication. We are the author of the very first implementation of a fully programmable optical linear circuit in silicon. This is the basic building block to have an optical processor (in this specific architecture). Ask me anything. [15] - http://www.photonics.intec.ugent.be/download/pub_3834.pdf
How is the optical switching power needs being addressed? Last I heard, you needed a high-powered laser on a non-linear material to turn transmission of a separate light signal on/off. Is that how things still work?
The chip described in this paper is actually less like a normal FPGA in that the chip isn't full of logic gates that can be reconfigured. Instead, it's full of optical elements (like modulators, multiplexers, beam splitters, and phase shifters) that can be connected in a certain pattern by erasing certain elements in the design.
Their hope is that by building a chip with lots of generally useful elements, many different industries will find it useful because they can just program the chip to utilize the components they need. (Fig. 6) Instead of computing with this chip, industry and researchers will be more interested in making things like optical transceivers. Having one common, reconfigurable chip that everyone uses would mean it could be mass produced at a lower cost, making research and production of silicon photonic systems more accessible.
At least that's what I've gathered from the paper - I'm definitely not an expert here. In theory I guess you could put optically switched gates in there too to make something more like an electrical FPGA - I'm sure that's long-term goal for the authors.
Re: Towards an optical FPGA – Programmable silicon photonic circuits [pdf]
#10I used to work in the industry and caught this article a few days ago during my usual arXiv trawling. Prof Reed's group has put out a few papers on erasable ion-implanted waveguides over the past couple of years from different angles, most notably erasable optical test points in circuits. The "FPGA" part is a bit of marketing because the waveguide erasure cannot be undone, but I do believe the last bit where the circuit topology is permanently altered between different optical communication protocols has some merit. This would enable manufacturers to be more nimble about which chips they can deliver based on demand, and might offer a yield recovery mechanism in a similar manner to which fuses are used on logic chips to disable non-functioning parts of the chip during the chip "Sort" step.
Overall, good paper.