NTT Research, Inc., a division of NTT, announced that its Physics and Informatics (PHI) Lab, working with Cornell University and Stanford University, has developed the world's first programmable nonlinear photonic waveguide that can switch between multiple nonlinear-optical functions on a single chip. The breakthrough fundamentally alters how nonlinear photonic devices operate, breaking the "one device, one function" paradigm, and significantly expands the applications for tunable light sources, optical and quantum computation, and communication.

Ryotatsu Yanagimoto, a scientist at NTT Research, led the research under the supervision of Peter L. McMahon, an associate professor at Cornell University. The paper, "Programmable On-Chip Nonlinear Photonics," was published by leading scientific journal Nature online on Oct. 8, 2025. It will be published in print by Nature on Nov. 13, 2025.