Analog Optical Computing Primitives in Silicon Photonics

TL;DR

This paper presents a novel silicon photonics approach to implement analog optical computing primitives, specifically exponentiation, using nonlinear Raman amplification saturation to address bandwidth and power limitations in electronic systems.

Contribution

It introduces a new method for realizing logarithmic-type analog co-processors in silicon photonics leveraging nonlinear absorption effects.

Findings

Successful implementation of exponentiation operation in silicon photonics.

Utilization of Raman amplification saturation for nonlinear optical processing.

Potential for high-bandwidth, low-power optical computing accelerators.

Abstract

Optical computing accelerators may help alleviate bandwidth and power consumption bottlenecks in electronics. We show an approach to implementing logarithmic-type analog co-processors in silicon photonics and use it to perform the exponentiation operation. The function is realized by exploiting nonlinear-absorption-enhanced Raman amplification saturation in a silicon waveguide.