Stanford, IBM Team To Explore Spintronics 126
saxylife writes "NYTimes and various other media are carrying a story on the latest venture between IBM and Stanford," which will concentrate on spintronics, in other words, controlling "the magnetic orientation of atoms to store data.
It's supposed to ease the pressure of hitting the barrier of Moore's law."
Honestly, folks. (Score:1, Redundant)
Re:Honestly, folks. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Honestly, folks. (Score:1)
Re:Honestly, folks. (Score:5, Informative)
Platter density and transistor density are more closely related than you might think.
Re:Honestly, folks. (Score:5, Funny)
Magnetics (Score:5, Informative)
One final interesing quote from the artice:
obligatory wikipedia... (Score:5, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spintronics
Re:obligatory wikipedia... (Score:5, Funny)
obligatory technovelgy (Score:1)
A device that made use of a relationship between electron spin, electromagnetism and gravity allowed any object to leave the Earth's surface.
We don't yet have a grand unified field theory or even know for certain how many dimensions there are in our universe. Imagine if researchers made a breakthrough like James Blish's spindizzy while working toward smaller electronics. Don't laugh. There are people working on this right now and not all of them are on the fringe.
Re:Magnetics (Score:5, Informative)
I remember there was similar research at Purdue University some months back. Here's the link [purdue.edu] and here's a pic [purdue.edu].
Re:Magnetics (Score:2)
Re:Magnetics (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, it's called radio.
Re:Magnetics (Score:2)
Re:Magnetics (Score:5, Informative)
Well, it's really the 'electromagnetic field' that can propogate at the speed of light in a vacuum (in the form of photons, which are of course the fundamental quanta of electromagnetic radiation.
Magnetic and electric fields are quite related, and only independent phenomena in time-independent processes (ie, electrostatics and magnetostatics). Namely, if you write Maxwell's Equations out and put all time derivatives to zero you really get separation of electric and magnetic fields. But for real systems, changes of one of these induces spatial variations of the other. So they're truly interconnected, and in fact they're most conveniently written in 4-dimensional form that describes special relativity perfectly.
Re:Magnetics (Score:1)
As it turns out, Magnetism does not exist. Magnetism is merely a manifestation of the quantum properties of matter -- Magnetism is the electron wave. In Collective Electrodynamics, Dr. Carver Mead moves beyond Maxwell, and incorporates the benefits of various experiments that Maxwell did not have access to. You can see a review of the book, here [amazon.com].
Re:Magnetics (Score:5, Informative)
And magnetism does exist, the magnetic and electric fields are really one and the same (in the proper 4-vector formalism). Magnetism can come from electron spin (explained very well in QFT) as well as moving charges (moving electron, for example). Spin has alot of quantum weirdness due to being angular momentum that's always 'just there' and discretized. But it's explained well enough w/ quantum field theory and group theory.
Nano-scale Fault Lines (Score:2, Interesting)
Tiny nano-scale structures change state when they are hit by alpha particles. Consider experimental atom-wide transistors that switch on a single electron. When an alpha particle hits the gate of such a transistor, it flips state momentaily, causing a chain reaction of corrupted data.
Fault intolerance constrains the minimum size of the transistors. There is i
Re:Nano-scale Fault Lines (Score:1)
Not necessarily true. Just because we don't need to use them anymore with current Si, doesn't mean that fault-tolerant gates can't be designed to compensate for these issues in Spintronics.
Let's face it, the occurrence of SEUs (single event upsets) is on the order of 200 FITs (failures per million hours), which is pretty low to begin with (now that the industry got rid of the alpha particle sources
I'm sorry, but... (Score:2, Insightful)
the last thing I want to do is invest in another technology based on magnetics. Solid state, non-magnetic media have fared far better for me in the long-term, and controlling magnetism on such a granular level only ups the chance that a few bits somewhere will go awry. The article even hints at it.
Re:I'm sorry, but... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I'm sorry, but... (Score:2)
Oh. I thought you said "party."
Re:I'm sorry, but... (Score:4, Interesting)
This isn't theoretical at all; CDs are routinely "destroyed", but they have a lot of error correction built into them so you don't even notice.
Computing the exact probabilities left as an exercise to the reader... but given any level of reliability there is some error correction scheme that can bring it up to any other given level of reliability (short of perfect, of course). Of course you can construct pathological cases that need as many bits as you like, the equations work that way too.
Re:I'm sorry, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
You're doing the same thing with 'traditional' electronics anyway. As things scale smaller and smaller, eventually the charge of a single electron will be the limiting factor within a bit, and even before that level is reached, fluctuations of several electrons could be large enough to cause things to "go awry" as you say.
The whole point of spintronics (or magnetoelectronics, it's less buzzword-trendy name) is to add an extra degree of freedom to electronics. Ie, instead of using components that switch on spin-independent electronic charge, one is now adding this extra component that can be switched/amplified/etc.
It's effectively opening up whole new doors, and spintronics represents the 2nd-rapidest movement of technology from lab to market (after the transistor, of course). The field is in its infancy right now, but has huge potential to revolutionize the types of electronic components that exist.
As you say, working on such nanoscale systems makes things really hard, and we're trying now to study and overcome these technical difficulties. But people are hopeful this will produce interesting devices, such as using the spin up/down eigenstates of the electron as the basis states for qubits in quantum computers, for example. Or many other quantum-dependent phenomena that are effectively averaged-out in standard electronics.
Re:I'm sorry, but... (Score:1, Flamebait)
So, unless you don't want to invest in another technology based on electrons, your comment is about as stupid as any in recent memory I've stumbled across. And on slashdot, that's saying something.
Already in use (Score:5, Funny)
Informative? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Informative? (Score:1)
One is not likely to see it on Slashdot however.
Re:Already in use (Score:1, Offtopic)
Re:Already in use (Score:3, Offtopic)
I saw a sig recently suggesting that instead of modding things funny, people should mod things underrated, until the "broken" moderation system is fixed. Well frankly, the very idea of the slashdot crew ever fixing the moderation system is utterly hilarious to me, but it's still a pretty good idea.
Why should providing humor be any less valuable than providing insight o
Re:Already in use (Score:1, Offtopic)
I agree with you on the funny mod deserving karma too. Seems to me that on sites with non-threaded discussion (cough, FARK), cracking jokes can get in the way of more relevant discussion, but that's much less of an issue on Slashdot. It's much easier to follow or reply to specific parts of the discussion here (like how we have this totally off-topic branch here).
Re:Already in use (Score:2)
You really ought to have that looked at. Could be TB.
Re:Already in use (Score:1)
Re:Already in use (Score:1)
Funny -2
Informative +3
Insightful +2
That's how I run.
Re:Already in use (Score:1)
Re:Already in use (Score:1)
For some it could be both...
Re:Already in use (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Already in use (Score:1, Funny)
You're confused.
FOX has had to neutralize the leftward spin on items acquired externally. Some people find it difficult to handle the resulting neutral objects, as they're used to items which have ridiculous charges. With a little thought, many people are able to avoid the errors of folk with simpler abilities.
It would be simpler if common sense were common. Too many people le
Re:Already in use (Score:1)
Re:Already in use (Score:3)
Actually I think Einstein's concept of relative frames applies here -- there is no "absolute leftward spin", or "absolute rightward spin", only a differential relative to the user's own spin. Thus, Observer A (say, Al Franken) and Observer B (perhaps Rush Limbaugh), when both observing the
Doesn't Moore.... (Score:2)
Unintended Side effects (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Unintended Side effects (Score:2)
Pfff... (Score:1)
Re:Unintended Side effects (Score:5, Funny)
Hahaha, oh that kills me. But seriously, Drakoids are pretty mean.
General information on spintronics (Score:5, Informative)
What's to know? (Score:5, Funny)
Will spin tunnel as well? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Will spin tunnel as well? (Score:5, Informative)
Spin is a property not a particle, hence your
question makes no sense (even RVB diehards who argue
for spin-charge separation in some materials will
assign spin to some quasiparticle, a "spinon", and
even in those cases tunneling is reserved for
electrons).
Your question is a bit like: "what does blue taste
like?"
Re:Will spin tunnel as well? (Score:2, Funny)
Raspberry.
Re:Will spin tunnel as well? (Score:2)
much more subtle than red.
Re:Will spin tunnel as well? (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, it's still the electrons tunneling across. And it's quite appropriate that you use the word 'barrier'.
There are spin tunnel junctions, where the electron tunnels through an insulator, and people are measuring how long the spin can be preserved if the electron tunnels into a standard metal. Ie, after enough scattering points the spin will be effectively randomized.
But yes, electrons are tunneling, and in some cases the spin of the electron (whether up or down) determines how well it will tunnel through the barrier. So spin is really another parameter that can be controlled to make spin-transistors or spin valves more dynamic than traditional transistors.
The no spin zone (Score:3, Interesting)
They exist... (Score:3, Informative)
The reason such things are expensive (and will likely remain so), is because with no moving parts, you have to have connectors to each bit of storage. That's a lot of interconnects requires, which takes up space, adding to the cost. Once you have a large enough array of bits, the routing of the data and address lines becomes the dominant factor in the construction.
Magnetics, Quantum Computing. Is Moore Crying ? (Score:1)
Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:5, Insightful)
Moore's law is not a physical law whatsover and has no bearing on actual chip development or progress. It is merely a way to predict the miniaturisation of chips. It does not take into account manufacturing processes whatsover, and so there is no theoretical end to it when current chip miniturisation techniques reach their theoretical or actual fundamental physical limits.
Instead, Moore's law is a time scale that predicts microchip technological advancement and it certainly isn't a precise observation.
Every so often, somebody starts to claim that Moore's law is broken, or going to be broken, or can't hold any longer. It never happens and is usually just the PR department looking for an interesting angle on a mildly interesting discovery.
Like "15 minutes of fame" (Score:2)
Re:Like "15 minutes of fame" (Score:2)
Its a pretty insightful (not to mention funny) observation about our television obsessed culture. Think about reality TV and then realize that the quote was made in the 60s.
Re:Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:2)
Re:Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:1)
Re:Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:1)
Astute observation. Although I find my shiny new Athlon64 3000 to be much, much faster at almost all things, in comparison to my good friends' 18-month-old 3.0GHz P4. (all other variables being almost equal. very similar systems.)
Does, or perhaps should, the mythical Moo
Re:Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:2)
The fact that this typicaly corresponds in some way with the power of of the CPU is what leads to the common misconception (and misuse) that Moore's law is talking about power - or even worse, clock speed.
Re:Moore's law is not a physical law. (Score:4, Informative)
The shrinking of transistor sizes has lead to smaller, cooler, faster, more powerful chips, but the speed increase is just a side effect of the smaller transistors. Were chip engineers more interested in packing more operations each cycle onto a chip, then you would see slower clock speeds with similar densities of transistors on larger areas (with more heat buildup being the speed limiter) -- something akin to the PowerPC chips vs the high-speed Pentiums. Similar densites of transistors and the PPCs actually do more floating-point operations per second (flops) than a Pentium that runs at about twice the clock.
Moore's is not a law (Score:5, Insightful)
The term "law" should only be applied to true laws, eg. thermodynamics, Newton's and Murphy's.
Re:Moore's is not a law (Score:2, Informative)
Umm.. Murphy's law is no more of a "true" law than Moore's is.
Re:Moore's is not a law (Score:1)
In other news... (Score:3, Funny)
Linus, meanwhile, pointed out that 100000% more of nothing is still nothing.
This is Cool Stuff! (Score:5, Informative)
I saw a presentation on spintronics given at WorldCon by Kevin Roche, who is one of the IBM researchers developing this stuff. He will be giving another presentation on it at -- of all places -- BayCon 2004.
I found his talk absolutely fascinating. He's basically created a "transistor" that allows through only electrons of a particular spin. Once you have an electric current composed of electrons spinning all the same way, you can do lots of unexpected things. One example: Light-emitting diodes emit polarized light! Even if you have only a cursory exposure to physics or chemistry, you'd probably enjoy his talk.
Schwab
Re:This is Cool Stuff! (Score:5, Informative)
What, you mean, like, say... a magnetic field? *grin* Seriously though, for those who aren't really familiar with spin, theres a decent quick-and-dirty spin primer here [gsu.edu], which includes a bit of details on the stern-gerlach experiment, which shows one way one might select electrons of only a certain spin.
Did anyone else think... (Score:1, Troll)
spintronics (Score:1)
hopefully good things will come from this.
Bubble Memory Redux (Score:2)
Just taken to the next level...
Interesting stuff if they can pull it off...
MRAM (Score:5, Informative)
Oh did I mention non-volatile ?
This isnt some fancy technology thats going to maybe apear in ten years.
There are preliminary datasheets out now right here. [cypress.com]
I cant wait to change my hdd over to this stuff (welll, that may be years away
I live in a land down under! (Score:1)
I live down under (in Australia). Given that spintronics is based on the concepts of up and down, would I need to install spintronic equipment inverted?
Oh God, What a Relief! (Score:1)
SPIN-A-TRON said from Washington today that everything was under control after a momentary glitch in the new Skynet command and control computers. It would be sending out T101 "claims adjusters" to process damage claims due to the malfunction...
Im waiting for Gravitronics.. (Score:1)
And here's another good idea:.... (Score:1)
cragen
ps. Lots of great ideas go pfft for reasons that were once thought not to be a problem -- like the hovercrafts that were once predicted to cause roads to be obsolete. Noise, cost, etc., ended that little drea
Re:Not News (Score:5, Interesting)
There were actully commercial parts made. But somebody killed it with their idea to have battery cmos ram. Then eeprom and flash memory came along.
They could actually make this work better with the refined manufacturing processes we have today. So I would not discount it out of hand.
Re:Not News (Score:2, Informative)
Bubble memory works not by altering the bubbles, but by creating a pattern of bubbles. In a way it was like punched paper tape.
I'd say that Spin memory is more like acoustic delay lines than bubble mem.
Re:Not News (Score:5, Informative)
spintronics, on the other hand, uses the charge and spin of electrons and holes in a similar method as electrons and holes are used in standard electronics. for example, the energy required to depopulate a channel in a transistor (turning it on or off) is far greater than the energy required to flip the spins of the charge carriers... so using that, you could have a smaller and lower energy transistor.
the limitation at the moment is in the materials, which is what we do... making them work at and above roomtemp for example.
if you be wanting to see a little more, check out our research page: http://depts.washington.edu/kkgroup/research/spin
Re:Not News (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Not News (Score:2)
Not that it will be that way with spintronics, but it seems that the difficulties are always in the details.
Not quite ... (Score:5, Informative)
The devices that are being talked about work in profoundly different ways to the old ST506 disks. Plus that fact that spintronics has been expanded to cover anyhting with magnets doesn't help clarification much.
For example, despite zdnets claims that IBM use GMR heads in their hard disks - that's not true, they are spin valves. These show a change in elecrical resistance in the prescence of a magnetic field - but no where near the magnitude of effect of a GMR device. That's fundementally different from the older method used in the read heads, which was to have a coil of wire, and detect the current induced in that coil.
If you can align the spin of electrons (do-able), then you can orient the spin, and thus have two independant channels within a single wire (horizontal and vertical, or whatever you want to call them). That's pretty novel.