Nanotubes Beat Silicon

The Halal text describes the "virtuous cycle of knowledge", where scientific knowledge is continually increased. New IT discoveries lead to more knowledge, which spurs new innovations resulting in more IT discoveries… You get the idea, the cycle just continues to feed itself.

One of the principles that enables this cycle is Moore's Law, which describes the trend of doubling processor chip performance every two years. As transistors and IC chips got smaller and smaller, many scientists have speculated that we are approaching the point where it is no longer financially feasible continue along the Moore's Law performance trend with silicon chips. They are just too expensive to mass produce.

Enter the carbon nanotube:

TechCast touts the IBM research showing carbon nanotubes outperform silicon transistors. The researchers found a transistor fashioned of carbon nanotubes used less power and carried more current than silicon transistors.

The nanotube transistor was "9 nanometers in size, one nanometer smaller than the presumed limit of silicon transistors."

While nanotubes may be the future of circuit chips, it is by no means certain. This technology is still in the R&D phase. It is both difficult and expensive to produce a carbon nanotube transistor. While TechCast may be right or wrong about this particular shift in IC design, I think they are right in that technology will find a way to continue the trend. Whether it be carbon nanotubes or some other new technology, the pace of innovation will not be slowed down by perceived limits of technology. We always seem to find a way.



References
http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/28/ibm-builds-9-nanometer-carbon-nanotube-transistor-puts-silicon/

http://spie.org/x23202.xml

http://www.techcast.org/Commentary.aspx?ID=267