This is a breakthrough news as reported in news.bbc.co.uk. Scientists at IBM have completed work that may make it possible to do away with the copper wires used to couple processing cores to each other. The connector created by the team uses light to pass data between the computational cores that is faster and uses less power than copper wires. The device is smaller than previously demonstrated connectors promising to shrink future computational clusters.

The IBM development, reported in the journal Optics Express, could replace the copper wires that connect cores with a device that converts electrical signals to pulses of light. The device, called a silicon Mach-Zehnder electro-optic modulator, is many times smaller than previously produced convertors.

So far the team has only demonstrated the technology in a lab and it could be years before it makes its way into commercial chips.

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