In technology, there is a strong desire to shrink things. Consider the sheer amount of news these days surrounding nanotechnology: it is arguably one of the fastest growing sectors in technology. Recent news out of two universities on potentially groundbreaking work on single-atom transistors should not be that surprising, then.
Researchers at the University of New South Wales, Australia and Purdue University say they have successfully created a transistor using a phosphorus atom inside of a silicon crystal. The development creates the basis for the development of a working quantum computer that can work at nano scale. Sounds like something out of Star Trek, right? The possibilities for these types of mini-computers are endless and possibly game-changing, and manufacturing and medicine are just some of the fields that may benefit from nanotechnology.
Here’s how the process works: researchers place the phosphorus atom using a scanning tunneling microscope. Once a trench is dug, the phosphorus atom is covered in silicon atoms. The physicists made two crucial breakthroughs here. First, they demonstrated an ability to precisely place the Lilliputian switch. Even more importantly, they used industry standard manufacturing practices, making the transistor both readable and writable. Moreover, they are able to consistently produce these tiny transistors using their process, a feat so far unreachable.
That’s the beginning of making nanotechnology viable and not just the subject of dozens — heck, hundreds — of stories on tech news sites. As exciting as this is for the field though, the manufacturing process is tedious, and not viable for mass production purposes. But it’s certainly a start.
The news also follows similar breakthroughs by IBM in January, where researchers announced they had stored binary data on just 12 atoms, a storage density some 100 times greater than the current ceiling for densities of today’s hard drive platters and flash chip technologies. That’s important to keep the pace of advancement in computing power and capability.
In any case, there’s one man who would be very happy about these researcher’s work: Intel co-founder Gordon Moore. His theory, dubbed “Moore’s law”, says that the number of transistors on a chip will double approximately every two years. Shrinking them down to not much bigger than the size of an atom? It’s not too far fetched to say Mr. Moore’s prediction will hold well into the next era of computing, too.