Scaling-driven nanoelectronics

 

Aspire - imec works on techniques to make transistors smaller, now concentrating on 22nm and 16nm technology. Transistors are the basic building blocks of chips for logic and memory, which are both developed at imec.

The continued miniaturization of transistors makes electronic appliances such as DVD players, digital cameras, or mp3 players cheaper. And they get more functions and consume less energy.

Until now, transistors could be scaled with relatively well-known techniques. But the physical limits of such scaling are approaching. To overcome those limits, new materials, architectures, and techniques will be required.