All-optical cascadable NOR gate with gain

An ultrafast, all-optical, three-terminal NOR gate based on soliton dragging in fibers is demonstrated with a gain of 4.5 and a switching energy of 30 pJ. Cascadability is proved with a tandem of two NOR gates that are configured as inverters. Time shifts from soliton dragging between two orthogonally polarized pulses in a fiber can be used for logic operations in a clocked system. Larger-than-predicted time shifts are observed because of self- and cross-Raman amplification effects.