Investigating Digital Optical Computing with Spatial Light Rebroadcasters

Spatial light rebroadcasters SLRs, consisting of thin films of luminescing electron trapping materials, are explored for digital optical computing. The status of optical computing is reviewed briefly. SLRs are characterized in detail fabrication, sensitivity, linearity, speed, resolution, and modulation. A number of optical experiments are described that were conducted to determine the device effectiveness, applications for which the devices are best suited, and the direction for research to develop more useful devices. Optical experiments with basic SLR modules include a cascadable module, binary matrix-vector multiplier, and correlator. The basic modules were then used in memory, adder, interconnection, and learning experiments. These experiments show that the SLR has potential for digital optical computing, particularly where high density long term storage is required. However, the lack of gain, incoherent output, and lot output signal, means that other collaborative devices are needed which limit the performance. Future directions are discussed.