Emerging Technologies and their Impact

Researchers at IBM have overcome an important obstacle to building computers based on carbon nanotubes, by developing a way to selectively arrange transistors that were made using the carbon molecules. The achievement, described in the current issue of Nano Letters, could help make large-scale integrated circuits built out of carbon nanotubes possible, leading to ultrafast, low-power processors.

For decades, the size of silicon-based transistors has decreased steadily while their performance has improved. As the devices approach their physical limits, though, researchers have started looking to less conventional structures and materials. Single-walled carbon nanotubes are one prominent candidate -- already researchers have built carbon nanotube transistors that show promising performance. According to estimates, carbon nanotubes have the potential to produce transistors that run 10 times faster than even anticipated future generations of silicon-based devices, while at the same time using less power.

Emerging Technologies and their Impact