NEWS Ben Johns, postdoctoral researcher at Umeå University, has been awarded a Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowship from the EU to investigate how light-based technologies could make future computing both faster and more energy efficient.
Ben Johns, postdoctoral fellow in the research group Ultrafast Nanoscience at the Department of Physics.
ImageMattias PetterssonCan we use only light to perform data processing and computations in the future? That is the question Ben Johns hopes to answer, now with support from a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) postdoctoral fellowship. His research focuses on so-called polaritons – a hybrid of light and matter particles that exhibits unique properties.
“In my project, I will investigate polaritons to study their suitability for all-optical technologies which can be much faster than current electronics-based systems while also being potentially more energy efficient”, says Ben Johns.
His goal is to understand how polaritons behave after interacting with extremely short pulses of light. These ‘ultrafast’ dynamics can shed new light the properties of polaritons that may make them useful in designing all-optical technologies in the future.
“My research is primarily focused on fundamental science. But since interest in polaritons is growing rapidly, this could lead to practical applications in the not-too-distant future,” he says.
The MSCA fellowship allows Ben Johns to pursue his ambitious research idea with a high degree of independence and to lay the foundation for a long-term research programme in the field.