Beyond 1 and 0: Engineers boost potential for creating successor to shrinking transistors

Beyond 1 and 0: Engineers boost the potential for creating a successor to shrinking transistors

Computers and similar electronic devices have been faster and smaller in decades because computer-chip manufacturers have learned how to reduce individual transistors, small electrical switches, which express digital information.

The discovery of the smallest possible transistor of scientists has allowed more packs on each chip. But the race towards the bottom is almost over: the researchers are rapidly approaching the minimum physical size for the transistor size, with the recent model about 10 nanometers - or just 30 atom-wide.

Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Texas, Dallas. Kyongjei Cho said, "The processing power of electronic devices comes from billions or billions of transistors, which are interconnected on a single computer chip." "But we are rapidly approaching the lower boundaries of scale."

In order to expand the search for faster processing speed, the microelectronics industry is looking for alternative technologies. Research can be done by expanding the terminology of the transistor in Cho's research published on 30 April in Journal Nature Communications.

Traditional transistors can only call two values ​​of information: As a switch, a transistor is either turned on or off, which translates into binary language 1s and 0s.

One way multi-value logic transistors based on this principle will be extended to increase the processing capacity without adding more transistors pairs, allowing more processing and processing of large amounts of information in the same device.

"The concept of multi-valve logic transistors is new, and there are many attempts to create such devices," Cho said. "we have done."

Through the theory, design, and simulation, Cho's Group in UT Dallas developed a fundamental physics of a multi-value logic transistor based on zinc oxide. His colleagues in South Korea successfully constructed and evaluated the performance of a prototype device.

Cho's device is capable of electronically stable and reliable intermediate states between 0 and 1, increasing the number of argument values ​​per transistor from two and three or four.

Cho said that new research is not only important because the technology is compatible with existing computer-chip configurations, but also that it will bridge the gap between today's computer and a quantum computer, potential next milestone in computing power

While a traditional computer uses accurate values ​​of 1s and 0s to calculate, the quantitative logic units of a quantum computer are more liquid, such values ​​that exist in combination with 1s and 0s or in any form Is the place Although they have not yet been commercially felt, large-scale quantum computers have the potential to gain more information and solve some problems.

Cho said, "The device involving multi-level logic will be faster than a conventional computer because it will only work with more than binary logic units. You have a constant value."

"Transistor is a very mature technology, and quantum computers are not close to being commercial," he continued. "There is a big gap." That is why we need some kind of evolutionary path, which is a great technique between binary and endless freedom. Quantum is not revolutionary in the form of computing, but it is evolving in that direction. "

Choi and his colleagues have used a novel configuration of two forms of combined zinc oxide to form a composite nanolere, which is then included with layers of other materials in superlatives.

Researchers discovered that they can embed the zinc oxide crystals, called the quantum dots necessary physics for multi-value logic, in amorphous zinc oxide. Amorphous solid-containing atoms are not strictly ordered because they are in crystalline solids.

"By engineering this material, we found that we can create a new electronic framework that enables this multi-level logic behavior," said Cho, who has applied for a patent. "Zinc oxide is a well-known material that produces both crystalline solid and amorphous solid, so it was an obvious choice to start, but this can not be the best material. Our next step will be to look at how much of this behavior We try to optimize technology from among other materials.

"Looking forward, I also want to see how we can combine this technique with a quantum device."

Dr. Jeong Kim, professor of materials science and engineering at UT Dallas, and Dr. Jeongwon Hwang, a former postdoctoral researcher at Cho's Laboratory, is currently co-author of the Nature article at the Chonnam  National University of South Korea. South Korean Universities: Heyang University, Guangzhou School of Technology and Technology, Yongi University, Kookam University and Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology.

The research was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea.