Regardless of the social or political landscape of today, Israelis continue to push, and occasionally break through, the boundaries of technology. And nowhere is the euphemism of exceeding limits more apt than in Tel Aviv University, where new nano-based technology is poised to make computers and the Internet hundreds of times faster.

This project is being spearheaded by Dr. Koby Scheuer of the University’s School of Electrical Engineering, and is based on a new plastic-based technology developed for the nano-photonics market. Termed as a ‘filter,’ the physical system works through nanometer-sized grooves embedded in a plastic material. When this material is used in fiber optic cable switches, Dr. Scheuer says that the resulting communication devices will be smaller, more flexible and more powerful.

The term ‘filter’ is used in this case precisely because that’s what the device in question does. Every optical communication device system uses filters to clean up signals and interpret messages. These signals are passed using fiber optic cables, and experts say that in the next decade, such cables will run from city to city and will feed directly into every individual home. When that happens, Tel Aviv University’s new plastic-based switches will make slow connection speeds and spotty feeds a thing of the past.

“Once Americans have a fiber optics cable coming into every home, all communication will go through it – telephone, cable TV, the Internet,” Dr. Scheuer explains. “But to avoid bottlenecks of information, we need to separate the information coming through into different channels. Our polymeric devices can do that in the optical domain – at a speed, quality and cost that the semi-conductor industry can’t even imagine.”

This new and groundbreaking device material is a prime example of just how big Israel is becoming in terms of technological advancement. Already, the country has produced more than a few noteworthy contributions in fields such as medicine, communications and power. And with progress going strong despite the rocky socio-political climate, it is clear that Israel’s tech development scene really has nowhere else to go but up.

View a previously written post by Mouli Cohen about Israel.