Computers Faster And More Efficiently
Are reduced in size, increase speed and efficiency. These are the qualities that drive science and industry to create new nanoscale structures that will help to speed up computers
Scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara have made a major contribution to this field by designing a new nanotechnology that will ultimately help make computers smaller, faster, and more efficient. The new process is described in the journal Science, September 26.
For the first time, the UCSB scientists have created a way to make square, nanoscale, chemical patterns -- from the bottom up -- that may be used in the manufacture of integrated circuit chips as early as 2011. It is called block co-polymer lithography.
Five leading manufacturers, including Intel and IBM, helped fund the research at UCSB, along with the National Science Foundation and other funders. The university has already applied for patents on the new methods developed here, and it will retain ownership.
A multidisciplinary team led by Craig Hawker, materials professor and director of the Materials Research Laboratory at UCSB, with professors Glenn Fredrickson and Edward J. Kramer, have developed a novel process for creating features on silicon wafers that are between five and 20 nanometers thick. (A nanometer is the thickness of one-thousandth of a human hair.)
Hawker explained that for the future we need more powerful microprocessors that use less energy. "If you can shrink all these things down, you get both," he said "You get power and energy efficiency in one package."
He said that the industry is up against Moore's law, a trend that Gordon Moore, Intel co-founder, first described in 1965 in which the power of the microprocessor doubles every 18 months. "One of the problems is that the industry is now running into physical limitations," said Hawker. "You can't shrink things down any more with the current technology." One of the ways that microprocessors are made is by using a top-down technique called photolithography, which involves shining light onto the surface of a silicon wafer, and making patterns. He explained that the size of the wavelength of light is becoming a limiting factor, and so his team has invented a new way of creating smaller patterns.
Full article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/09/080925144804.htmFor the first time, the UCSB scientists have created a way to make square, nanoscale, chemical patterns -- from the bottom up -- that may be used in the manufacture of integrated circuit chips as early as 2011. It is called block co-polymer lithography.
Five leading manufacturers, including Intel and IBM, helped fund the research at UCSB, along with the National Science Foundation and other funders. The university has already applied for patents on the new methods developed here, and it will retain ownership.
A multidisciplinary team led by Craig Hawker, materials professor and director of the Materials Research Laboratory at UCSB, with professors Glenn Fredrickson and Edward J. Kramer, have developed a novel process for creating features on silicon wafers that are between five and 20 nanometers thick. (A nanometer is the thickness of one-thousandth of a human hair.)
Hawker explained that for the future we need more powerful microprocessors that use less energy. "If you can shrink all these things down, you get both," he said "You get power and energy efficiency in one package."
He said that the industry is up against Moore's law, a trend that Gordon Moore, Intel co-founder, first described in 1965 in which the power of the microprocessor doubles every 18 months. "One of the problems is that the industry is now running into physical limitations," said Hawker. "You can't shrink things down any more with the current technology." One of the ways that microprocessors are made is by using a top-down technique called photolithography, which involves shining light onto the surface of a silicon wafer, and making patterns. He explained that the size of the wavelength of light is becoming a limiting factor, and so his team has invented a new way of creating smaller patterns.
Source: sciencedaily.com
Credit image: courtesy of University of California - Santa Barbara