Modern nanoscale electron tubes can be an alternative to silicon transistors

Now there are certain difficulties further scaling technology of semiconductors, as well as the associated problem of improving processor performance without increasing the clock frequency.

Researchers from the California Institute of Technology believe that they will be able to solve the existing problem, returning to a very old technology. Electron tubes, according to researcher Axel Scherer, can be the key to improving transistor performance and reducing power consumption.


Work with electronic lamps. Photo 1922, Systems Technical Journal Bell
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The project, which Scherer and his group are working on, has nothing to do with classic vacuum tubes - according to the team, they are about 1000 times smaller than human blood cells, about 6-8 nm. The main problem of modern silicon processors is significant heat generation. Electronic technology, developed by researchers at Caltech, emits energy much less than their silicon counterpart, which will solve the problem of overheating and tunnel effect .

Unlike silicon, which can be both a conductor and an insulator, depending on how it is chemically modified, Scherer lamps can be made from a variety of metals, such as tungsten, molybdenum, gold and platinum.

Electronic lamps are one of the options among a number of ideas. Other promising approaches include exotic materials such as carbon nanotubes and even microscopic mechanical switches.

Scherer is not trying to invent a transistor or completely replace silicon. Boeing has funded this research because of its potential use in space and aeronautical engineering, since silicon will obviously be the standard for many more years. Vacuum technology has many more problems to solve. When will it be possible to adjust the production of tens of thousands of processors on an electron tube basis per month? How much does it cost to replace equipment in production and build an ecosystem? Can it be organized fast enough to maintain current rates, and how will technology be integrated into existing production lines?

Miniature electronic tubes could become the main driving force for increasing the performance of computing systems, but cost and production problems are a huge obstacle to technology that positions itself as a competitor to silicon. Neither carbon nanotubes nor graphene have done so, despite their enormous initial potential.

The topic of using the principle of operation of vacuum electron tubes in modern chips is emerging not for the first time. Lamps are better than semiconductors carry electromagnetic impulses and radiation, so they are still used in military technology, which must withstand close explosions of nuclear bombs. So, a new generation of radio tubes is being developed by the American defense agency DARPA.

NASA is exploring the possibilities of the so-called " vacuum channel transistors ". The tiny dimensions of the electronic “nanolamps” somehow even facilitate their creation — unlike the conventional radio tubes, no extra effort is needed to create a vacuum inside the device. The distance between the cathode and the anode is much less than the mean free path of an electron at atmospheric pressure.

Scientists believe that nanoscale vacuum devices will be easier to make work in the terahertz range than traditional semiconductors. Although solid-state transistors have already managed to get to work at a frequency above the terahertz. So, the prototype of the Northrop Grumman corporation, made in the framework of the DARPA Terahertz Electronics program in 2014, overcame this milestone . It used indium phosphide transistors.

via extremetech