Parallel processing system architectures
Wide bandwidth routing and switching
Application specific data structures and associated algorithms
Unique circuits for demanding applications
The Ethernet standard is not well suited for maximum fiber bandwidth utilization. Only in combination with SONET or a similar synchronous protocol does 10 Gbit Ethernet map to a real frame in a standards oriented world. When 10 Gbit Ethernet is mapped to the OC-192 frame, the wavelength division multiplexing standards open vast fiber bandwidth.
Our research scientists have realized that such bandwidth holds great utility to the storage network interface. But the overhead of a synchronous network is neither justified nor desired for the local storage network. The engineers wanted to achieve a simple, standards-compliant 10 Gbit Ethernet interface but without limiting the fabric bandwidth. In fact they envisioned the desired mm wave switch bandwidth within the context of the standard.
Essentially the standard is a physical layer protocol that does not typically specify the precise wavelength. The utility of switching over mm-wave bandwidths was too great to ignore. Simply by tagging the wavelength the engineers created a link-layer addressing protocol suitable for switching over wide bandwidths. By maintaining all wavelengths according to the specification, each link is standards compliant.
This utility is encapsulated in the 10 Gbps connectivity established among all of the nodes. Conventional switches are only capable of non-blocking behavior under certain conditions. As the number of nodes is scaled, memory and processing power must be increased to avoid packet loss.
This is not the case for the truly non-blocking switch. The required processing power does not scale with the number of nodes because the interface bandwidth is sufficient. The memory does not need to scale either because the fabrics is truly non-blocking.
Research and Development
Research at Quantum Harmonics is true to the company's name. Basically we accept the fact that stuff is quantized and develop clever ways to exploit that fundamental nature.
Quantum mechanics is so fundamental to what we do that the routing and switching functions of the next generation Electric Data fabric is based on the quantization of the photon energy. In fact the ability of the fabric core to carry multiple channels of different frequency light is exploiting an important aspect of the quantized field.
High bandwidth, intelligent interfaces
We specialize in application of optics to high bandwidth fabric. The system incorporates certain optical components to implement the fabric interconnect, allowing multiple light frequencies to share a common waveguide. In a linear waveguide these light frequencies remain substantially unaffected by one another.
Unlike the multiple fixed wavelengths comprising the OC-192 network that supports our internet connection, the multiple wavelengths in the optical switch are tunable. Quantum Harmonics technology is applied to simultaneously accomplish two critical performance features:
- Stable and repeatable wavelength tuning
- Fast tuning to arbitrary wavelengths within the switch bandwidth
By utilizing optics we can make the switch bandwidth very large within practical limits. Such a huge switch bandwidth resolves interconnect issues that have plagued parallel processing systems for decades. This becomes the basis of the hardware interface to the intelligent agent.
Quantum encoding of future network interfaces
The future holds many exciting possibilities for optical switching and its applications to high performance computing. In this spirit we are investigating a variety of quantum encoding and switching methodologies ranging from microwave modulation of optical signals to polarization encoded quantum bits (qubits) driving nonlinear optical logic gates.
Our most aggressive project involves entangled pairs of qubits so we can extract information from physical properties that cannot be measured without affecting the quantum state. This turns the light into what is known as squeezed light. Squeezing the light can bring out such amazing properties because it involves quantum noise fluctuations below the coherent vacuum fluctuations in one quadrature of the phase.
