Spatiotemporal flat optics for terabit-per-second single-channel data transmission

TL;DR

This paper introduces an all-optical spatiotemporal transmitter capable of generating femtosecond pulses for high-capacity data transmission, achieving approximately 3 Tbit/s in a single channel without electronic bottlenecks.

Contribution

It demonstrates a novel all-optical transmitter that encodes data in femtosecond pulses using phase-modulated planar diffractive lenses for ultrahigh-speed communication.

Findings

Achieved nearly error-free transmission of images at 3 Tbit/s.

Utilized phase modulation to encode binary data in femtosecond pulses.

Enabled scalable, high-speed single-channel optical data transmission.

Abstract

Exponential growth in global data traffic demands ever-increasing transmission rates--a pursuit fundamentally constrained by the physical limitations of digital-to-analog converters (DACs). Existing strategies to overcome this bottleneck, such as multi-DAC arrays and optical time-division multiplexing, inevitably introduce system complexity and coordination overhead. Here we demonstrate an all-optical spatiotemporal transmitter that generates controllable high-repetition information-carrying femtosecond pulses at the focus of a phase-modulated planar diffractive lens (PDL) through optical-path-induced spatial-to-temporal conversion. Each pulse serves as an information bit, encoding binary data via on-axis focal intensity states corresponding to '0' and '1', achieved by switching between topological and constant phase modulations. High experimental orthogonality between arbitrary bits enables nearly error-free transmission of 15X15-pixel grayscale (8-bit coding) and colour (9-bit coding) images at a record-high single-channel rate of approximately 3 terabits per second (Tbit/s). Free from electronic and coordination bottlenecks, this all-optical transmitter establishes a scalable high-speed single-channel pathway toward ultrahigh-capacity optical communication.