The computer of the future will be smaller, fast, efficient and operate new materials. In this context, a group of American researchers created a prototype based on carbon nanotubes. Technology conceived as an alternative to the use of silicon, facing physical limits.
Presented as a graphene sheet rolled, the carbon nanotube is used here to create a new type of transistor. The computer developed by engineers at the University of Stanford is certainly rudimentary, it opens the way to more powerful but also energy-efficient machines. To achieve this functional prototype, the scientists had to overcome the major problems associated with the handling and assembly of carbon nanotubes. Indeed, they have imperfections that make their integration into electronic circuits. In the end, the computer with a processor consists of 178 transistors and clocked at 1 kHz. Each transistor contains 10 to 200 nanotubes. Also multitasking, it performs a basic operating system for counting and sorting numbers with the ability to switch between the two.
This computer is the first of its kind, but its designers are considering further research to develop models based on carbon nanotubes more sophisticated in the future.
