An Energy Barrier Framework for the Limits of Charge, Spin and Optical Switches

A generic abstraction for a binary switch is described and related to the operational properties of three physical implementations: charge, spin and optical. For a system at equilibrium with thermal environment, an energy barrier is needed to separate two distinguishable states. We utilize the fundamental concept of the energy barrier to study limiting characteristics of these three classes of binary switch. Some of the technical challenges that must be overcome if spin-based binary switch are to find widespread application are discussed