Another Beyond CMOS Candidate
Theory of Nano-Electron-Fluidic Logic (NFL): A New Digital “Electronics” Concept
A new digital “electronics” concept is introduced. The concept, called nano-electron-fluidic logic (NFL), is based on the generation, propagation and manipulation of plasmons in a two-dimensional electron gas behaving as an electron fluid. NFL gates are projected to exhibit femtojoule power dissipations and femtosecond switching speeds at finite temperatures. NFL represents a paradigm shift in digital technology, and is poised as a strong candidate for “beyond- CMOS” digital logic.
* Operates with far less heat and more efficient energies (femtojoules)
* Faster switching speeds (femtosecond)
* higher density potential for devices
* Terahertz operating speeds for chips
* Propogation velocity of electron fluid is hundreds of times faster than electrons in current CMOS
* Device construction is compatible with current lithography
Nano-Electron Fluidic Logic (NFL) Device patent application 2009026764
A nano-electron fluidic logic (NFL) device for controlling launching and propagation of at least one surface plasma wave (SPW) is disclosed. The NFL device comprises a metallic gate patterned with a plurality of terminals at which SPWs may be launched and a plurality of drain terminals at which the SPWs may be detected. A wave guiding structure such as a 2 DEG EF facilitates propagation of the SPW within the structure so as to scatter/steer the SPW in a direction different from a pre-scattering direction. A bias SPW is excited by an application of a control SPW with a momentum vector at an angle to the bias SPW and a control current with a wavevector which scatters the bias SPW in the direction of at least one output SPW, towards a drain terminal. The NFL device being rendered with device speed as a function of SPW propagation velocity.
* speed of the device is a function of SPW propagation velocity in terahertz switching frequencies.
A previous paper from 2004 by Héctor J. De Los Santos: NanoMEMS SYSTEMS ON CHIP
NanoMEMS exploits the convergence between nanotechnology and microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) brought about by advances in the ability to fabricate nanometer-scale electronic and mechanical device structures. While the “nano” aspect of this field is in its infancy, and is not expected to reach maturity until well into the 21st century, its “MEMS” aspect is a topic of much current and near-term impact in, for instance, RF/Wireless communications. In this context, we discuss the fundamentals of NanoMEMS, in particular, as it relates to its most speculative and futuristic paradigms and applications, and then focus on the RF/Wireless MEMS aspect, specifically in its role as enabler of ubiquitous wireless connectivity.
Intel and Sun Micro Product Roadmap Updates
* Intel will show off “Westmere,” the first processors built using a 32 nanometer (nm) manufacturing process.
* CPU manufacturing shrank from 65nm to 45nm to 32nm and next to 22nm.
* The next chip architecture will come in 2010, in the form of the new architecture codenamed “Sandy Bridge,” which will also be disclosed at this month’s IDF. Intel’s roadmap is process shrinkage and then better architecture and then process shrink etc… (tick-tock)
* This new-generation high-k metal gate transistor formula will give Intel “a 3+ year advantage in addressing leaky and energy inefficient transistors,” according to a blog post from Intel spokesman Bill Kircos Intel has shipped >200 million 45nm CPUs using high-k+ metal gate transistors.
* For the first time, Intel has developed a full-featured SoC process technology to complement the CPU-specific technology. This version is for our smarter System on Chip (SoC) product efforts, which emphasize lower power transistors
* Intel NMOS transistors now have 19% performance improvement over their 45nm counterparts and our PMOS transistors now have a 28% performance improvement over their 45nm counterparts.
* Another IDF highlight: Nehalem-based chips codenamed “Jasper Forest” and designed for the embedded and storage sectors. This family of products will bring Nehalem to the embedded market, offering integrated PCI Express (PCIe) and an integrated I/O hub in a dual-processor Xeon processor.
* Nehalem will allow for much faster and denser storage and communications solutions such as IPTV, VoIP, NAS, SAN and wireless radio network controllers
The UK Register has information on the Sun Sparc Roadmap. The 16-core “Rock” UltraSparc-RK processor for Sun’s once-and-never “Supernova” line of servers is not on the roadmap. The one-page roadmap is one given Sun’s customers – and presumably also Fujitsu’s customers – have been shown about the future Sparc processor lineup.
June 2009 Sun Roadmap
A long way off in late 2010 or early 2011, the Sparc Enterprise server lineup gets a speed boost to 3 GHz with the Jupiter-E chips.
After that, in 2012, Sun has made no commitment to the kicker line of Fujitsu “Advanced Product Line 2″ servers coming from Fujitsu. These APL2 machines are presumably to be based on the “Venus” eight-core Sparc64-VIII processor, which has a Sparc64-VIIIfx variant aimed at supercomputers. That Sparc64-VIIIfx chip will be used in a 10 petaflops massively parallel machine being built by Fujitsu and paid for by the Japanese government under the 1.2bn Project Keisoku effort.
All of this is subject to change, and some of it most certainly will once Oracle takes control of Sun.
"ENERGY: ‘Tree power’ harvests bio-energy"
Trees can be used to power circuits, but their voltage is too small to charge conventional batteries. University of Washington (Seattle) researchers recently demonstrated a nanoscale “boost converter” that integrates the ultra-low-voltage potentials generated by trees. A tree’s output voltage can be as low as 20 millivolts, according to the researchers. They designed a circuit to nevertheless accumulate enough power over time to produce a 1.1-volt output–enough to power wireless sensors. Last year, the theory behind “tree power” was demonstrated by MIT which spun-off the company Voltree Power (Canton, Mass.) which recently won a contract from the U.S. Forest Service to supply a wireless mesh sensor network powered by trees. The Forest Service operates 28,000 U.S. weather stations, each transmiting conditions on the ground to a satellite. Voltree’s energy harvester gathers information from the surrounding forest and transmits it wirelessly to existing weather stations. The architecture extends the stations’ reach under the forest canopy for the first time. Pilot sites will be tested this fall, with the first weather station upgrades scheduled for the first quarter of 2010.
Text: http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=219700690
"WIRELESS: Black Sand debuts first 3G power amp in CMOS"
“The breakthrough innovation that this team has developed is a power amplifier architecture that uses the smart capabilities of CMOS to solve the voltage breakthrough problem that here-to-fore has been a barrier to CMOS playing competitively in the 3G PA arena,” said John Diehl, Chief Executive Officer (CEO).
The company estimates that its CMOS 3G PA will be in mass production by 2010, the first year that 3G mobile phone sales will be larger than 2G sales (see figure).
The problem with casting 3G PA’s in silicon, which the experts at Black Sand claim to have overcome, was the size of the voltage swings necessary to ramp the power amplifier up and down as required of 3G, compared to always-on 2G PAs. By cascading CMOS transistors atop each other in a voltage-ladder like structure, Black Sand was able to tolerate the smaller voltage swings available in silicon, compared to gallium arsenide.
“A gallium arsenide device can handle a larger voltage swing before it fails–a CMOS transistor is lower, so it comes into the game handicapped from the prespective of power and efficiency,” said Diehl. “But our device uses a differential architecture that stacks transistors in such a way that allows the voltage required to swing over multiple transistors,” said Diehl.
The company also claims to have built-in the smarts to protects the CMOS circuits from thermal runaway problems as well as from impedance mismatches, such as touching the antenna with your hand. The chip also integrated onto their CMOS die the six discrete components that are required in addition to a gallium arsenide 3G PA chip, making the CMOS solution both smaller and cheaper, according to Black Sand.
CMOS PAs for 2G phones have already appeared, although the lion’s share of the market still goes to gallium arsenide devices. The first 2G CMOS PA was demonstrated by Silicon Laboratories back in 2004. Black Sand was founded in 2005 by three former Silicon Labs’ employees: Susanne Paul, chief technologist and architect of Black Sand’s chips, Dave Pietruszynski, vice president of engineering and Jim Nohrden vice president of marketing.
The world’s first 3G CMOS PA has been in development at Black Sand’s since June 2007, when the company got its first round of funding. Black Sand also announced today that it had secured $10 million in second round funding from Northbridge Venture Partners and Austin Ventures, bringing the total investment to $18.2 million. Black Sand will use the second round funding to ramp up mass production of its CMOS power amplifiers and to accelerate the development of additional chips.
Black Sand has yet to announce any customers, but claims it has samples out to mobile phone makers, netbook makers, datacard makers and to other application develpers that use gallium arsenide PAs today.
Text: http://nextgenlog.blogspot.com/2009/09/wireless-black-sand-debuts-first-3g.html
Technology and Economic Growth Enter Into the Heart of Scarcity
The UN millenium goals report for 2009, shows solid progress. 2009 saw slowing of progress and some backsliding because of the financial crisis.
A mid2009 UN report shows that GDP growth in the 2-5.5% is expected in Africa in 2010.
The IMF raised its GDP growth expectations in July 2009.
The African and middle east economies have performed relatively well in this crisis.
Africa 1.8 4.1 Emerging and developing economies 1.5 4.7
Africa’s total population is about 1 billion. The ten largest countries have about two thirds of the population.
Country 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Population Nigeria 1,108 1,200 1,264 1,334 1,405 1,480 155 million Ethiopia 427 442 459 475 500 538 85 million Egypt 2,456 2,610 2,860 3,130 3,337 3,634 81 million Congo 173 182 194 205 220 246 66 millionSouth Africa 4,943 5,014 5,207 5,456 5,744 6,031 49 millionTanzania 538 568 600 643 690 740 44 millionSudan 1,334 1,511 1,690 1,847 2,026 2,160 42 millionKenya 829 993 1,148 1,256 1,356 1,474 40 millionAlgeria 3,640 4,064 4,357 4,630 4,893 5,073 35 millionMorocco 2,655 2,802 2,991 3,211 3,449 3,689 32 million
List of African countries by population
Africa is Getting Some Technology and the Tech is Improving Lives
Foreign Policy: Thing Again Africa’s Crisis Africa, the continent is in far better shape than most experts think.
Some countries in the region are as poor as England under William the Conqueror, but that doesn’t mean Africa’s on the verge of doomsday. How many serfs had a cellphone? More than 63 million Nigerians do. Millions travel on buses and trucks across the continent each year, even if the average African road is still fairly bumpy. The list of modern technologies now ubiquitous in the region also includes cement, corrugated iron, steel wire, piping, plastic sheeting and containers, synthetic and cheap cotton clothing, rubber-soled shoes, bicycles, butane, paraffin candles, pens, paper, books, radios, televisions, vaccines, antibiotics, and bed nets.
The spread of these technologies has helped expand economies, improve quality of life, and extend health. About 10 percent of infants die in their first year of life in Africa — still shockingly high, but considerably lower than the European average less than 100 years ago, let alone 800 years past. And about two thirds of Africans are literate — a level achieved in Spain only in the 1920s.
Thanks to the spread of technologies and new ideas, African economies are expanding fast and population growth has been accompanied by better health. The continent of Africa has seen output expand 6½ times between 1950 and 2001. Of course, the population has grown nearly fourfold, so GDP per capita has only increased 67 percent
Some widespread health conditions in the region — notably HIV/AIDS — are still expensive to treat. But the most effective interventions for promoting health in Africa are remarkably cheap. Breast-feeding, hand-washing, sugar-salt solutions, vaccines, antibiotics, and bed nets together save millions — and could save millions more — and none need cost more than $5 a pop. Rollout of a vaccination program, for example, has slashed annual measles deaths in the region from 396,000 to 36,000 in just six years. And though Chad isn’t going to see universal college enrollment anytime soon, some very poor countries have already achieved near-universal primary education based in large part on free schooling.
A lot of aid to Africa is wasted, and some goes to support silly ideas or countries that can’t use it well. But aid has also supported some programs that have made a real difference in quality of life — things like supporting the measles vaccination program, helping to eradicate smallpox, fighting river blindness, funding educational radio programs, building sewage networks, and providing scholarships so that poor children can afford to stay in school
Cellphones Can be Cheaper than Clean Water and Sanitation
There is clearly a need for clean water and sanitation.
In 2003, 1.6 million deaths were estimated to be attributable to unsafe water and sanitation, including lack of hygiene; 90% of this burden is concentrated on children under five, mostly in developing countries. In spite of the considerable investment in the provision of water supply and sanitation in the 1980s and 1990s, in 2000 a significant proportion of the world’s population remained without access: an estimated 1.1 billion people were without access to improved water sources and 2.4 billion people lacked access to improved sanitation. Expanding this access is essential to reduce the burden of water-related diseases and to improve the well-being of a large part of the world’s population.
Clear dirty water is a serious problem but it usually does not kill people right away. It makes people sick and causes a percentage of deaths of children and the elderly. But clean water and sanitation projects tend to be large infrastructure spending efforts. The overall problem would need $25 billion/year for improved water and sanitation for all who currently need it and then about $150 billion/year for real infrastructure fix. Those numbers are for thousands of mostly million dollar and multi-million dollar projects across a hundred countries and dozens of projects in each country.
Cellphones are bought by individuals and can help connect people to finance and banking and helps with irrigation and farming with weather reports and connection to information. There is immediate financial gain by better access to markets, savings in time (do not need to travel someplace -you can just call) and allows for business opportunities. The rollout of cellphone networks by providers is far cheaper than the rollout of water/sanitation infrastructure and the economics for the providers is far better.
Africa: Cellphones Tipped to Drive Growth in Poor Nations
The mobility, ease of use, flexible deployment, and relatively low and declining roll-out costs of wireless technologies enable them to reach rural populations with low levels of income and literacy.
The report says the next billion mobile subscribers will consist mainly of the rural poor.
An important use of mobile phones in rural areas is to access market information.
TradeNet, a Ghana-based trading platform, allows users to sign up for SMS alerts about commodities and markets while receiving instant alerts for offers to buy or sell when anyone else on the network has submitted an offer.
Read more on the transformative benefits of cellphones in Africa:
Cellphones lower cost of irrigation
Cellphones support access to clean water
Africa: Cell Phones Transform Continent’s Development
Cellphones enable a financial revolution in Africa
Getting cellphones to rural Africa is a challenge and there are ingenius solutions.
Millenium village projects to solve poverty and other problems in Africa and other poor regions.
Conclusions
1. Africa is growing fairly fast now and has been for a decade. This could be the beginning of a multi-decade journey like the one in Asia to prosperity for the region.
2. Technology like cellphones or new technology that is emerging that costs less than $50-100/year per person and can be rolled out in smaller overall project sizes and with faster project return on investment will have a faster distribution than clean water and sanitation projects.
3. There are still plenty of super-cheap per person assistance to be done by the people themselves or with international aid that can save many millions of lives and improve quality of life.
4. Technology is a major force in ending extreme poverty.
2008 GDP statistics
East Asia & Pacific 5,186,610
Europe & Central Asia 3,860,600
Latin America & Caribbean 4,247,077
Middle East & North Africa 1,117,198
About 400 million people in Middle East and North Africa
Sub-Saharan Africa 987,120
Sub-saharan Africa has 800 million people The population is projected to grow to 1.5-2 billion in 2050.
India has 1.2 billion people and a GDP of 1.2 trillion. So collectively Africa is ahead of India. Sub-saharan Africa is economically similar to the most of India.
Sub-saharan Africa could follow fairly closely behind India’s development of 6-8% annual GDP growth, but per-capita GDP it will be about 20-50% slower to improve because of higher population growth rates.
South Asia 1,531,499
High income 43,189,942
Euro area 13,565,479
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