It is being reported in multiple sources that Intel has managed to develop "silicon lasers". The buzz is in a report in Nature here and is followed up in the NY Times (registration required) here as well as /. here.
It will be interesting to see how the optical methods play out against Sun's proximity communication.
For those readers who do not actively follow the technologies its about the speed and reliability of the interface between separate processing units (similar to communication between neurons in the brain), CPUs are probably way over the processing capacity of individual neurons (one could of course debate this…), but they are nowhere close to the density neurons achieve and the minimal communication delays between neurons. Laser and/or proximity based communication methods would seem to narrow that gap.
