Virtually every device you use—from the one you’re using to read this to the pocket calculator growing dust in the back of your desk—relies on the same basic technology: circuits containing many tiny transistors that communicate with each other using electrons. We’ve come a very long way since the room-sized computers of the 1950s, but as computing gets smaller, faster, and more complicated, we get closer to hitting a wall. There’s a physical limit to how powerful traditional computers can get. That’s why scientists are turning to completely new forms of technology for future computers.
The first in our three-part series explored how some computers use artificial neurons to “think.” Discover another way scientists are rethinking computing in the second part of the series below.
Computing At The Speed Of Light
Photons Aren’t A Fix-All
Researchers Create A Light-Based Microprocessor
It’s up to 50 times faster than electron-based microprocessors.