Critical need for this technology
The demand for computing power continues to accelerate, with tremendous growth in data centers and personal devices expected to exceed 20% for the next five years and likely beyond. This represents a threefold challenge of meeting market demand, at lower cost, and, perhaps most importantly, to simultaneously reduce energy consumption.
As we approach the end of the “first” Moore’s Law, the naïve solution to add more processors will push our global energy use to unsustainable levels. To combat these challenges, scientists are attempting a wide variety of approaches to create a new Moore’s Law.
This hybrid silicon laser technology fulfills specific targets laid out in the Department of Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing Offices’ multi-year program plan. In particular, the “Energy-Efficient Advanced Computing” goal that calls for: “Advance energy-efficient, cost-effective, and reproducible materials and manufacturing technologies to extend computational power beyond Moore’s Law”
Potential CO2 Reduction
Currently, data centers use about 1 percent of global electricity, accounting for approximately 150 MtCO2e of emissions each year. The demand for cloud computing and data services is growing rapidly, and the efficiency of data centers must continue to improve in order to prevent a rapid increase in energy usage and associated emissions. Iris Light Technologies solution will be a component of this improvement and could reduce emissions by several MtCO2e annually.
Competition
- To date, the main large-scale approach to integrated lasers are heterogeneous structures in which a direct-gap III-V wafer is bonded, and then processed, on top of a passive silicon circuit.
- There are presently no other 2D material-based lasers that work in silicon compatible with communications bands.
Potential markets
- The end users of this technology will span known large-scale industrial companies such as Intel, HP, Cisco, and Infinera, to emerging CMOS opto-electronics foundries for ‘”fabless” rapid-prototypes for small companies with no in-house fabrication facilities, such as the startup Elenion (New York).
- In other words, a properly developed hybrid silicon laser will be a standard, indispensable component in every CMOS opto-electronics foundry.
Value proposition: This is a technology with the potential to broadly impact all of integrated opto-electronics. Our hybrid silicon lasers are a foundational component of optical integrated circuits expected to foster 21st Century innovation akin to vast advances in computing brought about by the electronic revolution of the 20th Century. Specifically, our silicon laser is a strong candidate to be the light source in the opto-electronic integrated circuits driving, for example, data centers and super-computing facilities that increasingly rely on optics for improved performance.
Key innovation
Using a hybrid material system, we have developed a silicon laser by using the emerging two-dimensional nanomaterial phosphorene as the light emitter.
R&D status of product
In 2017, we conducted the first proof-of-concept experiments, showing stimulated emission (e.g., lasing) in the hybrid silicon-phosphorene system. A patent was issued in 2018. At CRI, we are currently translating the lab results to scalable industrial processes.
Team overview
Ph.D. and M.S. in Applied Physics from Columbia University (New York) and B.S. in Physics and Mathematics from Loyola University Chicago. Former Alexei Abrikosov Fellow at Argonne National Laboratory, where he led the research program on hybrid silicon lasers before spinning out Iris Light Technologies.
Technology profile
Status:R&D
Primary industry:Computing/Electronics
Category:Materials/Photonics
Estimated annual revenue:NA
Employs:NA
Social challenge:Energy efficiency
R&D commercial collaborator:NA
