Man has been trying to trace life in other planets and solar systems but even giant telescopes have not been able to succeed in the mission, thanks to strong sunrays that have made the images gathered blurred.
Now, scientists at Australian National University, Canberra, have developed a microchip which works on the principle of photonics. It can be integrated into the telescopes looking for lives to get clear pictures from other planets and track extra-terrestrial lives, if they are there at all, a report in the Age said.
It took 10 years to invent the microchip which uses photonics like electronics but with light to neutralize the light in the space, the report added. "This is all done on a micro-scale, so what channels the light will be about the width of a hair," the Age report quoted Harry-Dean Kenchington Goldsmith, a PhD student at ANU, as saying.
Goldsmith said the size of the all-important device that would make difficult missions look easy will be smaller than a centimeter while the entire chip on will be smaller than the palm of our hand. ANU's Associate Professor Steve Madden, who supervised the research, said he hoped the chip would help in discovering a planet where life exists.
Madden said the functioning of the optical chip happens similar to headphones that cancel noise. He further stated the optical chip worked in a similar way as noise-cancelling headphones. He added that the chip is a terferometer which adds an equivalent but opposite light waves that neutralize the sunlight, enabling one to see the light of the weaker planet and track if there is any life on it.
The researchers at ANU worked with those from the University of Sydney and the Australian Astronomical Observatory to succeed in something that could alter the future course of space science.
