Scientists' magic magic silica gel becomes a highway in the information age

In the era of information explosion, people's pursuit of high performance of data transmission, processing and storage systems is endless. With the rapid and comprehensive development of multimedia and the Internet, high-tech products such as high-capacity information storage, Internet switches, large screens and portable information displays all have rapidly increased requirements for bandwidth and capacity.

In addition, the rapid development of microelectronics technology also makes the demand for the function and performance of a single chip continue to increase. The next generation of high-end computers, such as the famous IBM Blue gene, require 10 to 40 gigabytes per second for transmission and switching between processing units. For computers based on electronic transmission, traditional printed circuit boards are used. Due to the limitations of the physical characteristics of electrical connections, the increase in transmission speed has almost reached the limit. The bus transmission is generally 500 megabytes, but the maximum is only gigabytes. Most local area networks are only 10~100 megabytes. Obviously, the speed of computer internal bus connection and computer interconnection has become the "bottleneck" of the entire computing environment. This is just like the problem of traffic congestion in a diversified metropolis with rapid development. The crux is that the development of traffic cannot keep up with the expansion speed of the city size and population. Because of the lag of traffic, those wonderful activities are like mirages.

Today, optical interconnects can provide higher throughput and density data transmission. The optical transmission capacity is tens of thousands of times higher than the circuit transmission, which can achieve the effect of short distance high-speed transmission. Polymer optoelectronic devices have become a hot topic in recent years because of their special advantages. At present, it is very attractive to embed the polymer light conducting layer of micron structure into the traditional printed circuit board to form a photoelectric circuit board, because it can be integrated into the traditional ordinary circuit board with high density, and also has the advantages of good production compatibility, low manufacturing cost, ease of use, and compatibility with SMT (surface mount technology). In the photoelectric circuit board, light and electricity are integrated. The signal input terminal controls the laser to emit photons through electronic signals, and transmits data information in the polymer light guide layer. At the other end of the circuit board, the photon signal is converted into the electronic signal through the photoelectric detector and input to the signal receiving end. Polymers such as polymethyl methacrylate (polymethyl methacrylate), polystyrene, polycarbonate, epoxy, polyimide, mono polysiloxane, and UV curable polysiloxane have been widely used by major research institutions and companies around the world, and have been made into light conducting layers in polymer based optoelectronic circuit boards, such as IBM, Dow Corning, GE, HP in the United States, SIEMENS and ALCATEL in the European Union, NTT in Japan, etc. However, due to the high cost of materials, high shrinkage, unstable thermal environment and humidity, expensive production equipment, poor adhesion with ordinary circuit boards, lack of systematic quality management and industrial implementation of reliability testing procedures and other difficult factors, no organization has reported that the products they developed can be applied to actual production through various optical communication and electronic product testing standards.

It is reported that Dr. Cai Dengke, a scientist from the famous Dortmund University of Technology in Germany, has made a breakthrough in this field of scientific research. Dr. Cai's use of silica gel as a photoconductive layer material has significantly improved the capacity and speed of information transmission. It has been widely used in the field of sealing, such as the sealing of doors and windows or swimming pools, and even in human medical cosmetic surgery. However, it is a great challenge to apply it to the field of photon transmission. Dr. Cai found the optical loss mechanism of silica gel through extensive and in-depth research on silica gel, and summarized two sets of theoretical formulas, which can be used to calculate the number of light wavelengths absorbed by silica gel and accurately predict the corresponding light loss value. The data results are very consistent with the experimental data. In addition, the method of deriving these empirical formulas is also suitable for the research of other optical materials, which will be very helpful for material scientists and optical engineers to improve materials to meet various optical needs.

A key manufacturing technology in the photoelectric circuit board is how to accurately package the high-precision light guide layer of micron level into the circuit board. However, the silica gel material of optical level cannot effectively adhere to the circuit board and cannot meet the production needs, which also limits its application in the photoelectric circuit board. The 2006 Football World Cup was held in Germany, which was a grand event of sports and cultural exchanges. The German government also took this opportunity to introduce their latest scientific and technological development to the world. Dr. Cai's mentor, Professor Neil, a famous professor in the field of optical interconnection, was invited to interview. He told reporters that he had contacted and cooperated with many German organic synthesis research institutions and silica gel manufacturers, but he had been unable to find effective ways, He lost many sleepless nights. After Dr. Cai's experiment successfully synthesized the adhesive reagent and developed the low-cost packaging method, which can achieve the high-precision and perfect packaging of the photoelectric circuit board without losing other technical indicators of the photoelectric circuit board, Professor Neil interestingly called this adhesive reagent "Dark Magic Formula". Due to its good optical performance, high temperature stability, chemical stability, etc., silica gel also has a very good application prospect in other fields, such as biochips, solar concentrators and heat dissipation units, but has been plagued by adhesion problems. According to Dr. Cai's research, this "black magic formula" is also applicable to low-cost mass production. Many companies and research institutions have actively contacted Professor Neil and Dr. Cai to seek cooperation, such as the famous Karlsruhe National Research Center in Germany, the biochip manufacturer Micropart, and the solar chip manufacturer Microtec.

In addition, Dr. Cai also developed a set of quality management and reliability testing methods especially for photoelectric circuit board products for the first time to test whether the photoelectric circuit board produced can meet the market demand. Through these accelerated aging test methods and reliability evaluation standard tests, it is concluded that the silicon based photoelectric circuit board made by him is very stable and reliable, which can fully meet the needs of long-term stable use. It is precisely because of Dr. Cai's breakthrough contribution in this field that he was invited to give a special report at the largest and most famous American Optical Fiber Conference (OFC) and Electronic Composition Conference (ECTC) in the optical field, as well as in the electronic composition and packaging field. Also because of the huge market value of this technology mentioned above, the world famous IBM Zurich Research Laboratory and the largest organic silica gel supplier Dow Corning of the United States invited Dr. Cai to the headquarters to give special reports, introduce the latest development and potential research directions in this field, and discuss various R&D and technical problems and propose solutions with their scientists and engineers.

With the rapid development of science and technology, it is hoped that in the near future, optical communication technology can truly achieve high-speed, fast and orderly. We can no longer worry about blocking information for processing work, making phone calls, watching movies or playing games on the Internet.