Towards boolean operations with thermal photons

Abstract

The Boolean algebra is the natural theoretical framework for a classical information treatment. The basic logical operations are usually performed using logic gates. In this Letter we demonstrate that NOT, OR and AND gates can be realized exploiting the near-field radiative interaction in N-body systems with phase change materials. With the recent development of a photon thermal transistor and thermal memory, this result paves the way for a full information treatment and smart solutions for active thermal management at nanoscale with photons.

References in corpus (4)

• Mott transition in VO2 revealed by infrared spectroscopy and nano-imaging
• Thermal Logic Gates: Computation with phonons
• Radiative bistability and thermal memory
• Modulation and amplification of radiative far field heat transfer: Towards a simple radiative thermal transistor

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Josephson thermal memory
• Thermal bistability through coupled photonic resonances