Electrons have a negative charge, but they also behave like tiny magnets. This property of electrons, called spin, can be used to transport or store information in electronic circuits. Scientists are looking for ways to create such spin-based electronics, as this is probably more energy efficient than normal electronics. University of Groningen physicist Siddhartha Omar discovered a way to transport spins over long enough distances to make such devices feasible. Furthermore, the material he used enabled him to control these spin currents.
Semiconductors
Paving a Way to Achieve Unexplored Semiconductor Nanostructures
Nanowire is a rod-structure with a diameter typically narrower than several hundred nanometers. Due to its size and structure, it exhibits characteristic properties which are not found in larger bulk materials. The study of III-V semiconductor nanowires has attracted much interest in recent decades due to their potential application in nanoscale quantum, photonic, electronic, and energy conversion, and in biological devices, based on their one-dimensional nature and large surface to volume ratio.
IDT Offers Avalanche Technology’s MRAM Devices to Complement its Broad Range of Semiconductor Devices
Integrated Device Technology, Inc. (IDT), a wholly owned subsidiary of Renesas Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723), today announced that it now offers Avalanche’s magnetic RAM (MRAM) devices to complement the extensive range of power, sensor, timing and microcontroller devices from Renesas. This allows IDT to serve as a single source for all the primary semiconductor devices manufacturers need for industrial control and automation systems, programmable logic controllers, medical diagnostic probes and equipment, multifunction printers, and IoT devices. Avalanche’s MRAM devices are ideal for high-speed, non-volatile memory applications such as program storage and data backup. IDT will offer Avalanche’s 4Mbit, 8Mbit and 16Mbit MRAM devices in two packages (SOIC and WSON) with two different temperature ratings (85°C and 105°C). Available speeds will be up to 108Mhz, with configurable interfaces for SPI, DPI, QPI with Single-Data-Rate and Double-Data-Rate modes.
Reducing Open-Circuit Voltage Loss in Organic Solar Cells
The power conversion efficiencies of organic solar cells (OSCs) based on blends of electron donor (D) and acceptor (A) semiconducting materials now exceed 16%. However, it is still lower than that of highly efficient inorganic SCs such as GaAs. The charge generation efficiency in OSCs nowadays is nearly 100%, thus reducing the energy loss in output voltage is critically important for further enhancing the efficiency of organic solar cells. Assistant…
AKHAN Semiconductor Inc. Partners with Lockheed Martin to Validate Breakthrough Weapons Countermeasure Technology
AKHAN Semiconductor Inc., in collaboration with Lockheed Martin, announced a successful demonstration of a new diamond-based coating technology that will enhance survivability of manned and unmanned military aircraft systems at the AUSA Annual Meeting and Expo. AKHAN Semiconductor Inc. is a technology company specializing in the fabrication and application of electronics-grade diamonds as functional semiconductors. The Illinois-based company has been awarded numerous patents and trademarks for inventions under its Miraj Diamond® Protective Coating platform of products.
GLOBALFOUNDRIES Acquires Smartcom’s PDK Engineering Team to Expand Worldwide Design Enablement Capacity
GLOBALFOUNDRIES® (GF®), the world’s leading specialty foundry, announced today that it has acquired the PDK (Process Design Kit) engineering team from Smartcom Bulgaria AD in Sofia, Bulgaria. The newly acquired team will enhance GF’s scale and capabilities, while strengthening competitiveness of its specialized application solutions to further position the company for growth and value creation.
SIA Statement on ‘Phase One’ U.S.-China Trade Agreement
“The ‘phase one’ agreement announced today is welcome news for the semiconductor industry, and we look forward to seeing it finalized. Today’s deal eases tensions and gives both sides a chance to get back to the negotiating table to strike a more comprehensive deal in the future. We’re especially encouraged new tariff increases will not go forward on Oct. 15. We urge negotiators to build on this momentum and reach a high-standard, enforceable, and sustainable agreement that ensures a level playing field for companies doing business in China, protects IP, and removes harmful tariffs.”
Ultrafast Particle Interactions Could Help Make Quantum Information Devices Feasible
A study conducted by researchers at the University of Campinas’s Gleb Wataghin Institute of Physics (IFGW-UNICAMP) in São Paulo State, Brazil, in partnership with colleagues at the University of Michigan’s Physics Department in Ann Arbor, USA, and Sungkyunkwan University’s Advanced Institute of Nanotechnology (SAINT SKKU) in Seoul, South Korea, set out to understand the decoherence process on the femtosecond (10-15 s) timescale. An article describing the results was published in Physical Review Letters.
Scientists Discover Method to Create and Trap Trions at Room Temperature
Trions consist of three charged particles bound together by very weak bonding energy. Although trions can potentially carry more information than electrons in applications such as electronics and quantum computing, trions are typically unstable at room temperature, and the bonds between trion particles are so weak that they quickly fall apart. Most research on trions requires supercooled temperatures, and even then, their fleeting nature has made trions difficult to control and hard to study. A University of Maryland-led team of researchers has discovered a method to reliably synthesize and trap trions that remain stable at room temperature.
Cornell NanoScale Facility (CNF) and Plasma-Therm Collaborate on Atomic Layer Etching (ALE)
The Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility (CNF), a leading university research facility at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY and Plasma-Therm LLC, an innovator in plasma processing technology, located in St. Petersburg, FL, announce a joint development agreement (JDA) to advance atomic layer etching (ALE) for nanoscale device fabrication. Under this agreement, Plasma-Therm will provide a state-of-the-art ALE system, while CNF will provide ALE process and device development on a wide range of materials serving a broad research community.
