Having previously discovered an ‘attractive’ force of light, showing how it can be manipulated to move circuits on a silicon board, Hong Tang and his team of researchers from the Yale University have now discovered a new ‘repulsive’ force of light that too can be used to move components on a silicon microchip. Now, if the discovery can actually be implemented, then we vision a future where the nanodevices will be powered by light instead of electricity, which is, powering devices with a combination of attractive and repulsive lights.
The attractive and repulsive lights move the objects sideways to the direction in which the light is travelling. Initially using only attractive force of light the scientists could move the objects on the silicon board to one side (towards itself), but with the use of both attractive and repulsive lights, they can move the objects in both directions.
The team split a beam of infrared light in order to create the repulsive force. Forcing the beams down different lengths of a silicon nanowire, as a result the two beams moved out of phase with each other, creating a controllable repulsive force – thus more the beam phased out the more repulsion they create. Creating repulsive light, scientists can now manipulate components on silicon microchips without electricity, thus giving hope to creating functional nanodevices powered by light alone.
Via: io9
