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Frontiers of Engineering Reports on Leading-Edge Engineering from the 2008 Symposium (2009) / Chapter Skim
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The Quest for the Next Information-Processing Technology--Jeffrey J. Welser
Pages 45-52

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From page 45...
... is taking on the grand challenge of finding a "new switch" that can continue the exponential increase in information-processing capability, which has benefited not only the semiconductor industry, but nearly every aspect of our electronics and information technology-driven modern economy. Introduction For more than three decades, the semiconductor industry has been driven by its ability to scale the size of the complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS)
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From page 46...
... To enable the semiconductor industry to continue the historical cost and performance trends for information technology, these new devices must have a significant advantage over ultimate FETs in power, performance, density, and/or cost. To meet these goals, NRI has focused primarily on research on devices that use new computational-state variables beyond electronic charge.
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From page 47...
... The analysis showed that the channel could conceivably be scaled down to ~1.5 nm and that the transistor could have a minimum switching speed of ~40 fs -- significantly smaller and faster than today's FETs of about 30 nm in channel length with ~1 ps switching time. However, to avoid leakage over the barrier at room temperature, the voltage could not be scaled as rapidly as the physical dimensions, and the resulting power density for these switches at maximum packing density would be on the order of 1 MW/cm2 -- orders of magnitude higher than the practical air-cooling limit of ~100 W/cm2.
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From page 48...
... If the relaxation time is sufficiently long, the potential barriers could be lower, allowing state manipulation with lower switching energy.
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From page 49...
... New Methods of Managing Heat: Nanoscale Phonon Engineering Finding more energy-efficient ways to cool devices, given the immediate importance for current CMOS chips, is a very active area of research in the semiconductor industry. The NRI focus is limited to looking at ways of controlling phonon flow for more efficient phonon extraction and manipulation in device structures.
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From page 50...
... Summary The daunting grand challenge of finding a device capable of extending information processing beyond the ultimate limits of CMOS technology is similar to the challenge faced in the 1940s when solid-state transistors were developed to replace vacuum tubes. The current NRI program (Welser et al., 2008)
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From page 51...
... 1965. Cramming more components onto integrated circuits.
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From page 52...
... 2003. Limits to binary logic switch scaling -- a gedanken model.
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Key Terms

  • research initiative
  • nanoelectronics research
  • power density
  • logic switch
  • increasing power

  • research currently
  • sponsor research
  • nanoparticle research
  • semiconductor research
  • semiconductor companies

  • oxide semiconductor
  • transistor switches
  • beyond electronic
  • critical dimensions
  • grand challenge

  • modern economy
  • fet operation
  • components onto
  • applied voltages
  • improved nanoscale

  • electronic charge
  • reason scaling
  • ing nonequilibrium
  • consumes half
  • switches faster

  • primary reason
  • demonstrate novel
  • devices capable
  • variables beyond
  • thermal management


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