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Researchers from NASA Ames and Semiconductor Research Corp. convene Thursday to decide how nanotechnology will first support, and then take over, the function of silicon.
"People have been writing the obituary of silicon for a long time and it hasn't happened, but it's going to happen," said Meyya Meyyappan, project manager for nanotechnology at NASA Ames. "At that time, we are going to need a technology to take its place."
In the meantime, Meyyappan said nanotechnology can create hybrid microprocessors to prolong the life of silicon.
It will be some time before molecular nanotechnology can build materials or machines atom by atom. But carbon nanotubes, which wrap sheets of hexagonal carbon atoms into cylinders, are being tested in some applications today.
The two-day workshop, Emerging Issues and Opportunities in Nanotubes and Nanoelectronics is co-sponsored by the Semiconductor Research Corp., a cooperative research body financed by Intel, Hewlett-Packard, and AMD. It will examine how carbon nanotubes could be used in conjunction with silicon-based technologies to provide tiny, but very powerful, components 500 times smaller than a Pentium chip.
Carbon nanotubes are an ideal material for microprocessors because they have a diameter of approximately 1/10,000 of a human hair, are capable of carrying a very high current, and are one sixth of the weight and 100 times stronger than steel.
It is possible, therefore, that they could be used to build field-effect transistors or on/off switches in computing devices.
Because of their tiny diameter and great strength, carbon nanotubes can be used instead of lasers to etch silicon in microprocessors, according to Deepak Srivastava, senior research scientist at NASA Ames in Mountain View, California.
Or they could be used in surgery to cut or penetrate tiny spaces such as a human cell.
"It's not as far-fetched as you think," said Srivastava. "I believe that in three to five years we will see carbon nanotubes used in industry for applications such as silicon etching."
NASA's interest in the technology is twofold: First, carbon nanotubes could be used in creating tiny computer components. Second, they could be mixed with other elements to create strong lightweight materials for building spacecrafts. It's rocket science, after all.
"We've got to go to Mars. And it costs around US$100,000 for every pound we ship into space," said Meyyappan. "That is why we are interested in nanotechnology."
