Phys.org September 9, 2024 Because of the quantum nature of electrons, real interfaces have finite thickness, leading to nonclassical surface effects that influence light scattering in small particles. Electrical gating offers a promising route to control and study these effects, as static screening charges reside at the boundary. An international team of researchers (Germany, Denmark) investigated the modulation of the surface response upon direct electrical charging of single plasmonic nanoresonators. By analyzing measured changes in light scattering within the framework of surface response functions, they found the resonance shift well accounted for by modulation of the classical in-plane surface current. […]
Category Archives: Computer chips
Opening up the potential of thin-film electronics for flexible chip design
Science Daily April 24, 2024 Thin film transistor fabrication (TFT) is currently lacking a fully verified, universal design approach. This increases the cost and complexity of manufacturing TFT-based flexible electronics, slowing down their integration into more mature applications and limiting the design complexity achievable by foundries. Researchers in Belgium developed a stable and high-yield TFT platform for the fabless manufacturing of two mainstream TFT technologies, wafer-based amorphous indium–gallium–zinc oxide and panel-based low-temperature polycrystalline silicon, two key TFT technologies applicable to flexible substrates. They designed the 6502 microprocessor in both technologies to demonstrate and expand the multi-project wafer approach. Enabling the […]
MIT engineers “grow” atomically thin transistors on top of computer chips
MIT News April 27, 2023 Semiconductor chips are traditionally made with bulk materials, which are boxy 3D structures, so stacking multiple layers of transistors to create denser integrations is very difficult. Semiconductor transistors made from ultrathin 2D materials, each only about three atoms in thickness, could be stacked up to create more powerful chips. Using a low-temperature growth process that does not damage the chip, an international team of researchers (USA – MIT, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Sweden) has demonstrated a novel technology that can effectively and efficiently “grow” layers of 2D transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) materials directly on top […]
Faster and more efficient computer chips thanks to germanium
Science Daily November 8, 2022 The compound semiconductor silicon-germanium has decisive advantages over today’s silicon technology in terms of energy efficiency and achievable clock frequencies. But establishing contacts between metal and semiconductor on a nanoscale in a reliable way is the main problem with a high proportion of germanium than with silicon. An international team of researchers (Austria, Switzerland, France) found a method to create perfect interfaces between aluminium contacts and silicon germanium components on an atomic scale. They produced a thin silicon layer and the silicon-germanium. By heating the structure in a controlled manner a contact was created between […]
Materials science engineers work on new material for computer chips
Science Daily October 11, 2022 To save energy in computing by co-locating computation and memory elements in an integrated circuit manufacturing, a team of researchers in the US (University of Virginia, Washington State University, North Carolina State University, Sandia National Laboratory, Pennsylvania State University, Brown University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory) explained how to engineer and enhance the stability of ferroelectric hafnium oxides, which are compatible with mainstream semiconductors. They showed that the presence of the top electrode during thermal processing results in larger tensile biaxial stress magnitudes and concomitant increases in ferroelectric phase fraction and polarization response, whereas film chemistry, […]