Tag Archives: internet of things (IoT)

New breed of memristors?

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This new ‘breed’ of memristor (a component in brain-like/neuromorphic computing) is a kind of thin film. First, here’s an explanation of neuromorphic computing from the Finnish researchers looking into a new kind of memristor, from a January 10, 2018 news item on Nanowerk,

The internet of things [IOT] is coming, that much we know. But still it won’t; not until we have components and chips that can handle the explosion of data that comes with IoT. In 2020, there will already be 50 billion industrial internet sensors in place all around us. A single autonomous device – a smart watch, a cleaning robot, or a driverless car – can produce gigabytes of data each day, whereas an airbus may have over 10 000 sensors in one wing alone.

Two hurdles need to be overcome. First, current transistors in computer chips must be miniaturized to the size of only few nanometres; the problem is they won’t work anymore then. Second, analysing and storing unprecedented amounts of data will require equally huge amounts of energy. Sayani Majumdar, Academy Fellow at Aalto University, along with her colleagues, is designing technology to tackle both issues.

Majumdar has with her colleagues designed and fabricated the basic building blocks of future components in what are called “neuromorphic” computers inspired by the human brain. It’s a field of research on which the largest ICT companies in the world and also the EU are investing heavily. Still, no one has yet come up with a nano-scale hardware architecture that could be scaled to industrial manufacture and use.

An Aalto University January 10, 2018 press release, which originated the news item, provides more detail about the work,

“The technology and design of neuromorphic computing is advancing more rapidly than its rival revolution, quantum computing. There is already wide speculation both in academia and company R&D about ways to inscribe heavy computing capabilities in the hardware of smart phones, tablets and laptops. The key is to achieve the extreme energy-efficiency of a biological brain and mimic the way neural networks process information through electric impulses,” explains Majumdar.

Basic components for computers that work like the brain

In their recent article in Advanced Functional Materials, Majumdar and her team show how they have fabricated a new breed of “ferroelectric tunnel junctions”, that is, few-nanometre-thick ferroelectric thin films sandwiched between two electrodes. They have abilities beyond existing technologies and bode well for energy-efficient and stable neuromorphic computing.

The junctions work in low voltages of less than five volts and with a variety of electrode materials – including silicon used in chips in most of our electronics. They also can retain data for more than 10 years without power and be manufactured in normal conditions.

Tunnel junctions have up to this point mostly been made of metal oxides and require 700 degree Celsius temperatures and high vacuums to manufacture. Ferroelectric materials also contain lead which makes them – and all our computers – a serious environmental hazard.

“Our junctions are made out of organic hydro-carbon materials and they would reduce the amount of toxic heavy metal waste in electronics. We can also make thousands of junctions a day in room temperature without them suffering from the water or oxygen in the air”, explains Majumdar.

What makes ferroelectric thin film components great for neuromorphic computers is their ability to switch between not only binary states – 0 and 1 – but a large number of intermediate states as well. This allows them to ‘memorise’ information not unlike the brain: to store it for a long time with minute amounts of energy and to retain the information they have once received – even after being switched off and on again.

We are no longer talking of transistors, but ‘memristors’. They are ideal for computation similar to that in biological brains.  Take for example the Mars 2020 Rover about to go chart the composition of another planet. For the Rover to work and process data on its own using only a single solar panel as an energy source, the unsupervised algorithms in it will need to use an artificial brain in the hardware.

“What we are striving for now, is to integrate millions of our tunnel junction memristors into a network on a one square centimetre area. We can expect to pack so many in such a small space because we have now achieved a record-high difference in the current between on and off-states in the junctions and that provides functional stability. The memristors could then perform complex tasks like image and pattern recognition and make decisions autonomously,” says Majumdar.

The probe-station device (the full instrument, left, and a closer view of the device connection, right) which measures the electrical responses of the basic components for computers mimicking the human brain. The tunnel junctions are on a thin film on the substrate plate. Photo: Tapio Reinekoski

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Electrode Dependence of Tunneling Electroresistance and Switching Stability in Organic Ferroelectric P(VDF-TrFE)-Based Tunnel Junctions by Sayani Majumdar, Binbin Chen, Qi Hang Qin, Himadri S. Majumdar, and Sebastiaan van Dijken. Advanced Functional Materials Vol. 28 Issue 2 DOI: 10.1002/adfm.201703273 Version of Record online: 27 NOV 2017

© 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

This paper is behind a paywall.

Is technology taking our jobs? (a Women in Communications and Technology, BC Chapter event) and Brave New Work in Vancouver (Canada)

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Awkwardly named as it is, the Women in Communications and Technology BC Chapter (WCTBC) has been reinvigorated after a moribund period (from a Feb. 21, 2018 posting by Rebecca Bollwitt for the Miss 604 blog),

There’s an exciting new organization and event series coming to Vancouver, which will aim to connect, inspire, and advance women in the communications and technology industries. I’m honoured to be on the Board of Directors for the newly rebooted Women in Communications and Technology, BC Chapter (“WCTBC”) and we’re ready to announce our first event!

Women in Debate: Is Technology Taking Our Jobs?

When: Tuesday, March 6, 2018 at 5:30pm
Where: BLG – 200 Burrard, 1200 Waterfront Centre, Vancouver
Tickets: Register online today. The cost is $25 for WCT members and $35 for non-members.

Automation, driven by technological progress, has been expanding for the past several decades. As the pace of development increases, so has the urgency in the debate about the potential effects of automation on jobs, employment, and human activity. Will new technology spawn mass unemployment, as the robots take jobs away from humans? Or is this part of a cycle that predates even the Industrial Revolution in which some jobs will become obsolete, while new jobs will be created?

Debaters:
Christin Wiedemann – Co-CEO, PQA Testing
Kathy Gibson – President, Catchy Consulting
Laura Sukorokoff – Senior Trainer & Communications, Hyperwallet
Sally Whitehead – Global Director, Sophos

Based on the Oxford style debates popularized by the podcast ‘Intelligence Squared’, the BC chapter of Women in Communications and Technology brings you Women in Debate: Is Technology Taking Our Jobs?

For anyone not familiar with “Intelligence Squared,”  there’s this from their About webpage,

ntelligence Squared is the world’s premier forum for debate and intelligent discussion. Live and online we take you to the heart of the issues that matter, in the company of some of the world’s sharpest minds and most exciting orators.

Intelligence Squared Live

Our events have captured the imagination of public audiences for more than a decade, welcoming the biggest names in politics, journalism and the arts. Our celebrated list of speakers includes President Jimmy Carter, Stephen Fry, Patti Smith, Richard Dawkins, Sean Penn, Marina Abramovic, Werner Herzog, Terry Gilliam, Anne Marie Slaughter, Reverend Jesse Jackson, Mary Beard, Yuval Noah Harari, Jonathan Franzen, Salman Rushdie, Eric Schmidt, Richard Branson, Professor Brian Cox, Nate Silver, Umberto Eco, Martin Amis and Grayson Perry.

…

Further digging into WCTBC unearthed this story about the reasons for its ‘reboot’, from the Who we are / Regional Chapters / British Columbia webpage,

“Earlier this month [October 2017?], Christin Wiedemann and Briana Sim, co-Chairs of the BC Chapter of WCT, attended a Women in IoT [Internet of Things] event in Vancouver. The event was organized by the GE Women’s Network and TELUS Connections, with WCT as an event partner. The event sold out after only two days, and close to 200 women attended.

Five female panelists representing different backgrounds and industries talked about the impact IoT is having on our lives today, and how they think IoT fits into the future of the technology landscape. Christin facilitated the Q&A portion of the event, and had an opportunity to share that the BC chapter is rebooting and hopes to launch a kickoff event later in November”

You can find a summary of the event here (http://gereports.ca/theres-lots-room-us-top-insights-five-canadas-top-women-business-leaders-iot/#), and you can also check out the Storify (https://storify.com/cwiedemann/women-in-iot​).”

– October 6th, 2017

Simon Fraser University’s Brave New Work

Coincidentally or not, there’s a major series of events being offered by Simon Fraser University’s (SFU; located in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) Public Square Programme in their 2018 Community Summit Series titled: Brave New Work; How can we thrive in the changing world of work? which takes place February 26, 2018 to March 7, 2018.

There’s not a single mention (!!!!!) of Brave New World (by Aldous Huxley) in what is clearly word play based on this man’s book.

From the 2018 Community Summit: Brave New Work webpage on the SFU website (Note: Links have been removed),

How can we thrive in the changing world of work?

The 2018 Community Summit, Brave New Work, invites us to consider how we can all thrive in the changing world of work.

Technological growth is happening at an unprecedented rate and scale, and it is fundamentally altering the way we organize and value work. The work we do (and how we do it) is changing. One of the biggest challenges in effectively responding to this new world of work is creating a shared understanding of the issues at play and how they intersect. Individuals, businesses, governments, educational institutions, and civil society must collaborate to construct the future we want.

The future of work is here, but it’s still ours to define. From February 26th to March 7th, we will convene diverse communities through a range of events and activities to provoke thinking and encourage solution-finding. We hope you’ll join us.

The New World of Work: Thriving or Surviving?

As part of its 2018 Community Summit, Brave New Work, SFU Public Square is proud to present, in partnership with Vancity, an evening with Van Jones and Anne-Marie Slaughter, moderated by CBC’s Laura Lynch at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

Van Jones and Anne-Marie Slaughter, two leading commentators on the American economy, will discuss the role that citizens, governments and civil society can play in shaping the future of work. They will explore the challenges ahead, as well as how these challenges might be addressed through green jobs, emergent industries, education and public policy.

Join us for an important conversation about how the future of work can be made to work for all of us.

Are you a member of Vancity? As one of the many perks of being a Vancity member, you have access to a free ticket to attend the event. For your free ticket, please visit Vancity for more information. There are a limited number of seats reserved for Vancity members, so we encourage you to register early.

Tickets are now on sale, get yours today!

Future of Work in Canada: Emerging Trends and Opportunities

What are some of the trends currently defining the new world of work in Canada, and what does our future look like? What opportunities can be seized to build more competitive, prosperous, and inclusive organizations? This mini-conference, presented in partnership with Deloitte Canada, will feature panel discussions and presentations by representatives from Deloitte, Brookfield Institute for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Vancity, Futurpreneur, and many more.

Work in the 21st Century: Innovations in Research

Research doesn’t just live in libraries and academic papers; it has a profound impact on our day to day lives. Work in the 21st Century is a dynamic evening that showcases the SFU researchers and entrepreneurs who are leading the way in making innovative impacts in the new world of work.

Basic Income

This lecture will examine the question of basic income (BI). A neoliberal version of BI is being considered and even developed by a number of governments and institutions of global capitalism. This form of BI could enhance the supply of low wage precarious workers, by offering a public subsidy to employers, paid for by cuts to others areas of social provision.

ReframeWork

ReframeWork is a national gathering of leading thinkers and innovators on the topic of Future of Work. We will explore how Canada can lead in forming new systems for good work and identify the richest areas of opportunity for solution-building that affects broader change.

The Urban Worker Project Skillshare

The Urban Worker Project Skillshare is a day-long gathering, bringing together over 150 independent workers to lean on each other, learn from each other, get valuable expert advice, and build community. Join us!

SFU City Conversations: Making Visible the Invisible

Are outdated and stereotypical gender roles contributing to the invisible workload? What is the invisible workload anyway? Don’t miss this special edition of SFU City Conversations on intersectionality and invisible labour, presented in partnership with the Simon Fraser Student Society Women’s Centre.

Climate of Work: How Does Climate Change Affect the Future of Work

What does our changing climate have to do with the future of work? Join Embark as they explore the ways our climate impacts different industries such as planning, communications or entrepreneurship.

Symposium: Art, Labour, and the Future of Work

One of the key distinguishing features of Western modernity is that the activity of labour has always been at the heart of our self-understanding. Work defines who we are. But what might we do in a world without work? Join SFU’s Institute for the Humanities for a symposium on art, aesthetics, and self-understanding.

Worker Writers and the Poetics of Labour

If you gave a worker a pen, what would they write? What stories would they tell, and what experiences might they share? Hear poetry about what it is to work in the 21st century directly from participants of the Worker Writers School at this free public poetry reading.

Creating a Diverse and Resilient Economy in Metro Vancouver

This panel conversation event will focus on the future of employment in Metro Vancouver, and planning for the employment lands that support the regional economy. What are the trends and issues related to employment in various sectors in Metro Vancouver, and how does land use planning, regulation, and market demand affect the future of work regionally?

Preparing Students for the Future World of Work

This event, hosted by CACEE Canada West and SFU Career and Volunteer Services, will feature presentations and discussions on how post-secondary institutions can prepare students for the future of work.

Work and Purpose Later in Life

How is the changing world of work affecting older adults? And what role should work play in our lives, anyway? This special Philosophers’ Cafe will address questions of retirement, purpose, and work for older adults.

Beyond Bitcoin: Blockchain and the Future of Work

Blockchain technology is making headlines. Enthusiastic or skeptic, the focus of this dialogue will be to better understand key concepts and to explore the wide-ranging applications of distributed ledgers and the implications for business here in BC and in the global economy.

Building Your Resilience

Being a university student can be stressful. This interactive event will share key strategies for enhancing your resilience and well-being, that will support your success now and in your future career.

We may not be working because of robots (no mention of automation in the SFU descriptions?) but we sure will talk about work-related topics. Sarcasm aside, it’s good to see this interest in work and in public discussion although I’m deeply puzzled by SFU’s decision to seemingly ignore technology, except for blockchain. Thank goodness for WCTBC. At any rate, I’m often somewhat envious of what goes on elsewhere so it’s nice to see this level of excitement and effort here in Vancouver.

Memristors at Masdar

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The Masdar Institute of Science and Technology (Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; Masdar Institute Wikipedia entry) featured its work with memristors in an Oct. 1, 2017 Masdar Institute press release by Erica Solomon (for anyone who’s interested, I have a simple description of memristors and links to more posts about them after the press release),

Researchers Develop New Memristor Prototype Capable of Performing Complex Operations at High-Speed and Low Power, Could Lead to Advancements in Internet of Things, Portable Healthcare Sensing and other Embedded Technologies

Computer circuits in development at the Khalifa University of Science and Technology could make future computers much more compact, efficient and powerful thanks to advancements being made in memory technologies that combine processing and memory storage functions into one densely packed “memristor.”

Enabling faster, smaller and ultra-low-power computers with memristors could have a big impact on embedded technologies, which enable Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence, and portable healthcare sensing systems, says Dr. Baker Mohammad, Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Dr. Mohammad co-authored a book on memristor technologies, which has just been released by Springer, a leading global scientific publisher of books and journals, with Class of 2017 PhD graduate Heba Abunahla. The book, titled Memristor Technology: Synthesis and Modeling for Sensing and Security Applications, provides readers with a single-source guide to fabricate, characterize and model memristor devices for sensing applications.

The pair also contributed to a paper on memristor research that was published in IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers earlier this month with Class of 2017 MSc graduate Muath Abu Lebdeh and Dr. Mahmoud Al-Qutayri, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.PhD student Yasmin Halawani is also an active member of Dr. Mohammad’s research team.

Conventional computers rely on energy and time-consuming processes to move information back and forth between the computer central processing unit (CPU) and the memory, which are separately located. A memristor, which is an electrical resistor that remembers how much current flows through it, can bridge the gap between computation and storage. Instead of fetching data from the memory and sending that data to the CPU where it is then processed, memristors have the potential to store and process data simultaneously.

“Memristors allow computers to perform many operations at the same time without having to move data around, thereby reducing latency, energy requirements, costs and chip size,” Dr. Mohammad explained. “We are focused on extending the logic gate design of the current memristor architecture with one that leads to even greater reduction of latency, energy dissipation and size.”

Logic gates control an electronics logical operation on one or more binary inputs and typically produce a single binary output. That is why they are at the heart of what makes a computer work, allowing a CPU to carry out a given set of instructions, which are received as electrical signals, using one or a combination of the seven basic logical operations: AND, OR, NOT, XOR, XNOR, NAND and NOR.

The team’s latest work is aimed at advancing a memristor’s ability to perform a complex logic operation, known as the XNOR (Exclusive NOR) logic gate function, which is the most complex logic gate operation among the seven basic logic gates types.

Designing memristive logic gates is difficult, as they require that each electrical input and output be in the form of electrical resistance rather than electrical voltage.

“However, we were able to successfully design an XNOR logic gate prototype with a novel structure, by layering bipolar and unipolar memristor types in a novel heterogeneous structure, which led to a reduction in latency and energy consumption for a memristive XNOR logic circuit gate by 50% compared to state-of the art state full logic proposed by leading research institutes,” Dr. Mohammad revealed.

The team’s current work builds on five years of research in the field of memristors, which is expected to reach a market value of US$384 million by 2025, according to a recent report from Research and Markets. Up to now, the team has fabricated and characterized several memristor prototypes, assessing how different design structures influence efficiency and inform potential applications. Some innovative memristor technology applications the team discovered include machine vision, radiation sensing and diabetes detection. Two patents have already been issued by the US Patents and Trademark Office (USPTO) for novel memristor designs invented by the team, with two additional patents pending.

Their robust research efforts have also led to the publication of several papers on the technology in high impact journals, including The Journal of Physical Chemistry, Materials Chemistry and Physics, and IEEE TCAS. This strong technology base paved the way for undergraduate senior students Reem Aldahmani, Amani Alshkeili, and Reem Jassem Jaffar to build novel and efficient memristive sensing prototypes.

The memristor research is also set to get an additional boost thanks to the new University merger, which Dr. Mohammad believes could help expedite the team’s research and development efforts through convenient and continuous access to the wider range of specialized facilities and tools the new university has on offer.

The team’s prototype memristors are now in the laboratory prototype stage, and Dr. Mohammad plans to initiate discussions for internal partnership opportunities with the Khalifa University Robotics Institute, followed by external collaboration with leading semiconductor companies such as Abu Dhabi-owned GlobalFoundries, to accelerate the transfer of his team’s technology to the market.

With initial positive findings and the promise of further development through the University’s enhanced portfolio of research facilities, this project is a perfect demonstration of how the Khalifa University of Science and Technology is pushing the envelope of electronics and semiconductor technologies to help transform Abu Dhabi into a high-tech hub for research and entrepreneurship.

h/t Oct. 4, 2017 Nanowerk news item

Slightly restating it from the press release, a memristor is a nanoscale electrical component which mimics neural plasticity. Memristor combines the word ‘memory’ with ‘resistor’.

For those who’d like a little more, there are three components: capacitors, inductors, and resistors which make up an electrical circuit. The resistor is the circuit element which represents the resistance to the flow of electric current.  As for how this relates to the memristor (from the Memristor Wikipedia entry; Note: Links have been removed),

The memristor’s electrical resistance is not constant but depends on the history of current that had previously flowed through the device, i.e., its present resistance depends on how much electric charge has flowed in what direction through it in the past; the device remembers its history — the so-called non-volatility property.[2] When the electric power supply is turned off, the memristor remembers its most recent resistance until it is turned on again

The memristor could lead to more energy-saving devices but much of the current (pun noted) interest lies in its similarity to neural plasticity and its potential application on neuromorphic engineering (brainlike computing).

Here’s a sampling of some of the more recent memristor postings on this blog:

August 24, 2017: Neuristors and brainlike computing

June 28, 2017: Dr. Wei Lu and bio-inspired ‘memristor’ chips

May 2, 2017: Predicting how a memristor functions

December 30, 2016: Changing synaptic connectivity with a memristor

December 5, 2016: The memristor as computing device

November 1, 2016: The memristor as the ‘missing link’ in bioelectronic medicine?

You can find more by using ‘memristor’ as the search term in the blog search function or on the search engine of your choice.

IBM and a 5 nanometre chip

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If this continues, they’re going to have change the scale from nano to pico. IBM has announced work on a 5 nanometre (5nm) chip in a June 5, 2017 news item on Nanotechnology Now,

IBM (NYSE: IBM), its Research Alliance partners GLOBALFOUNDRIES and Samsung, and equipment suppliers have developed an industry-first process to build silicon nanosheet transistors that will enable 5 nanometer (nm) chips. The details of the process will be presented at the 2017 Symposia on VLSI Technology and Circuits conference in Kyoto, Japan. In less than two years since developing a 7nm test node chip with 20 billion transistors, scientists have paved the way for 30 billion switches on a fingernail-sized chip.

A June 5, 2017 IBM news release, which originated the news item, spells out some of the details about IBM’s latest breakthrough,

The resulting increase in performance will help accelerate cognitive computing [emphasis mine], the Internet of Things (IoT), and other data-intensive applications delivered in the cloud. The power savings could also mean that the batteries in smartphones and other mobile products could last two to three times longer than today’s devices, before needing to be charged.

Scientists working as part of the IBM-led Research Alliance at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute Colleges of Nanoscale Science and Engineering’s NanoTech Complex in Albany, NY achieved the breakthrough by using stacks of silicon nanosheets as the device structure of the transistor, instead of the standard FinFET architecture, which is the blueprint for the semiconductor industry up through 7nm node technology.

“For business and society to meet the demands of cognitive and cloud computing in the coming years, advancement in semiconductor technology is essential,” said Arvind Krishna, senior vice president, Hybrid Cloud, and director, IBM Research. “That’s why IBM aggressively pursues new and different architectures and materials that push the limits of this industry, and brings them to market in technologies like mainframes and our cognitive systems.”

The silicon nanosheet transistor demonstration, as detailed in the Research Alliance paper Stacked Nanosheet Gate-All-Around Transistor to Enable Scaling Beyond FinFET, and published by VLSI, proves that 5nm chips are possible, more powerful, and not too far off in the future.

Compared to the leading edge 10nm technology available in the market, a nanosheet-based 5nm technology can deliver 40 percent performance enhancement at fixed power, or 75 percent power savings at matched performance. This improvement enables a significant boost to meeting the future demands of artificial intelligence (AI) systems, virtual reality and mobile devices.

Building a New Switch

“This announcement is the latest example of the world-class research that continues to emerge from our groundbreaking public-private partnership in New York,” said Gary Patton, CTO and Head of Worldwide R&D at GLOBALFOUNDRIES. “As we make progress toward commercializing 7nm in 2018 at our Fab 8 manufacturing facility, we are actively pursuing next-generation technologies at 5nm and beyond to maintain technology leadership and enable our customers to produce a smaller, faster, and more cost efficient generation of semiconductors.”

IBM Research has explored nanosheet semiconductor technology for more than 10 years. This work is the first in the industry to demonstrate the feasibility to design and fabricate stacked nanosheet devices with electrical properties superior to FinFET architecture.

This same Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) lithography approach used to produce the 7nm test node and its 20 billion transistors was applied to the nanosheet transistor architecture. Using EUV lithography, the width of the nanosheets can be adjusted continuously, all within a single manufacturing process or chip design. This adjustability permits the fine-tuning of performance and power for specific circuits – something not possible with today’s FinFET transistor architecture production, which is limited by its current-carrying fin height. Therefore, while FinFET chips can scale to 5nm, simply reducing the amount of space between fins does not provide increased current flow for additional performance.

“Today’s announcement continues the public-private model collaboration with IBM that is energizing SUNY-Polytechnic’s, Albany’s, and New York State’s leadership and innovation in developing next generation technologies,” said Dr. Bahgat Sammakia, Interim President, SUNY Polytechnic Institute. “We believe that enabling the first 5nm transistor is a significant milestone for the entire semiconductor industry as we continue to push beyond the limitations of our current capabilities. SUNY Poly’s partnership with IBM and Empire State Development is a perfect example of how Industry, Government and Academia can successfully collaborate and have a broad and positive impact on society.”

Part of IBM’s $3 billion, five-year investment in chip R&D (announced in 2014), the proof of nanosheet architecture scaling to a 5nm node continues IBM’s legacy of historic contributions to silicon and semiconductor innovation. They include the invention or first implementation of the single cell DRAM, the Dennard Scaling Laws, chemically amplified photoresists, copper interconnect wiring, Silicon on Insulator, strained engineering, multi core microprocessors, immersion lithography, high speed SiGe, High-k gate dielectrics, embedded DRAM, 3D chip stacking and Air gap insulators.

I last wrote about IBM and computer chips in a July 15, 2015 posting regarding their 7nm chip. You may want to scroll down approximately 55% of the way where I note research from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) about metal nanoparticles with unexpected properties possibly having an impact on nanoelectronics.

Getting back to IBM, they have produced a slick video about their 5nm chip breakthrough,

Meanwhile, Katherine Bourzac provides technical detail in a June 5, 2017 posting on the Nanoclast blog (on the IEEE [Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers] website), Note: A link has been removed,

Researchers at IBM believe the future of the transistor is in stacked nanosheets. …

Today’s state-of-the-art transistor is the finFET, named for the fin-like ridges of current-carrying silicon that project from the chip’s surface. The silicon fins are surrounded on their three exposed sides by a structure called the gate. The gate switches the flow of current on, and prevents electrons from leaking out when the transistor is off. This design is expected to last from this year’s bleeding-edge process technology, the “10-nanometer” node, through the next node, 7 nanometers. But any smaller, and these transistors will become difficult to switch off: electrons will leak out, even with the three-sided gates.

So the semiconductor industry has been working on alternatives for the upcoming 5 nanometer node. One popular idea is to use lateral silicon nanowires that are completely surrounded by the gate, preventing electron leaks and saving power. This design is called “gate all around.” IBM’s new design is a variation on this. In their test chips, each transistor is made up of three stacked horizontal sheets of silicon, each only a few nanometers thick and completely surrounded by a gate.

Why a sheet instead of a wire? Huiming Bu, director of silicon integration and devices at IBM, says nanosheets can bring back one of the benefits of pre-finFET, planar designs. Designers used to be able to vary the width of a transistor to prioritize fast operations or energy efficiency. Varying the amount of silicon in a finFET transistor is not practicable because it would mean making some fins taller and other shorter. Fins must all be the same height due to manufacturing constraints, says Bu.

IBM’s nanosheets can range from 8 to 50 nanometers in width. “Wider gives you better performance but takes more power, smaller width relaxes performance but reduces power use,” says Bu. This will allow circuit designers to pick and choose what they need, whether they are making a power efficient mobile chip processor or designing a bank of SRAM memory. “We are bringing flexibility back to the designers,” he says.

The test chips have 30 billion transistors. …

It was a struggle trying to edit Bourzac’s posting with its good detail and clear writing. I encourage you to read it (June 5, 2017 posting) in its entirety.

As for where this drive downwards to the ‘ever smaller’ is going, there’s Dexter’s Johnson’s June 29, 2017 posting about another IBM team’s research on his Nanoclast blog on the IEEE website (Note: Links have been removed),

There have been increasing signs coming from the research community that carbon nanotubes are beginning to step up to the challenge of offering a real alternative to silicon-based complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) transistors.

Now, researchers at IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center have advanced carbon nanotube-based transistors another step toward meeting the demands of the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) for the next decade. The IBM researchers have fabricated a p-channel transistor based on carbon nanotubes that takes up less than half the space of leading silicon technologies while operating at a lower voltage.

In research described in the journal Science, the IBM scientists used a carbon nanotube p-channel to reduce the transistor footprint; their transistor contains all components to 40 square nanometers [emphasis mine], an ITRS roadmap benchmark for ten years out.

One of the keys to being able to reduce the transistor to such a small size is the use of the carbon nanotube as the channel in place of silicon. The nanotube is only 1 nanometer thick. Such thinness offers a significant advantage in electrostatics, so that it’s possible to reduce the device gate length to 10 nanometers without seeing the device performance adversely affected by short-channel effects. An additional benefit of the nanotubes is that the electrons travel much faster, which contributes to a higher level of device performance.

Happy reading!

The security of the Internet of Nano-Things with NanoMalaysia’s CEO Dr Rezal Khairi Ahmad

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I’ve not come across the Internet of Nano-Things before and I’m always glad to be introduced to something new. In this case, I’m doubly happy as I get to catch up (a little) with the Malaysian nano scene. From an April 19, 2017 article by Avanti Kumar for mis.asia.com (Note: Links have been removed),

After being certified in 2011 as a nanocentre, national applied research agency MIMOS continued to make regular moves to boost Malaysia’s nanotechnology ambitions. This included helping to develop the national graphene action plan (NGAP 2020).

…

Much of the task of driving and commercialising the NGAP ecosystem is in the hands of NanoMalaysia, which was incorporated in 2011 as a company limited by guarantee (CLG) under Malaysia’s Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (MOSTI) to act as a business entity.

During another event in March 2016 where I saw that 360 new products were to be commercialised under NGAP, NanoMalaysia’s chief executive officer Dr. Rezal Khairi Ahmad said that benefits would include a US$5 billion impact on GNI (gross net income) and 9,000 related new jobs by the year 2020.

In his capacity as a keynote speaker at this year’s Computerworld Security Summit in Kuala Lumpur (20 April 2017), Dr Rezal agreed to a security-themed interview on this relatively new industry sector.  This is also part of a series of special security features.

To start, I asked Dr Rezal for a brief run-through of his role.

[RKA]  I’m the founding Chief Executive Officer and also Board Member of NanoMalaysia, Nano Commerce Sdn. Bhd, representing NanoMalaysia’s business interests, the Chairman of NanoVerify Sdn. Bhd, a nanotechnology certification entity and a Director of Nanovation Ventures Sdn. Bhd., an investment arm of NanoMalaysia.

Prior to this, I served as Acting Under-Secretary of National Nanotechnology Directorate, Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation on the policy aspect of nanotechnology and vice president of [national investment body] Khazanah Nasional touching on human capital and investment research.

NanoMalaysia’s primary role in the development of Malaysia’s National Graphene Action Plan 2020 together with Agensi Inovasi Malaysia and PEMANDU [Performance Management & Delivery Unit attached to Prime Minister’s Office] is a major landmark in our journey to ensure Malaysia stays competitive in the global innovation landscape particularly in nanotechnology, which cuts across all industries including ICT [information and communications technologies].

Can you talk about graphene and its significance to local industry?

Graphene is touted as one of the game-changing advanced materials made of one atom-thick carbon and acknowledged by World Economic Forum [WEF] as no. 4 emerging technology in 2016.

…

Beyond being a fancy nano material, graphene plays a central role in the development of endogenous hardware aspects of Malaysia’s Internet of Things aspirations or the now evolved Internet of Nano-Things (IoNT). Some of these are:
-·Super small, lightweight and hyper-sensitive low-cost Graphene-based sensors and Radio Frequency ID (RFID)
– Higher speed, Low loss and power consumption graphene based optical transmitter and receiver for 5G systems
– Making IoNT a low-cost and practical industrial and domestic solutions in Malaysia.

Let’s move to the security aspects of nanotechnology: what’s your take on IoNT?

In the context of IoNT, which WEF acknowledged to be the top emerging technology in 2016, the current work-in-progress,  ‘ubiquitous’ deployment of sensors in Malaysia and worldwide, I certainly see increasing data security risks at the sensor, transmission, collection, processing and even analytics levels.

The initial industry approaches to IoNT data security will probably be polarised between cascaded and centralised system approaches.

I think some hacking attacks will obviously focus on data theft. I therefore foresee a trend favouring cascaded security – with both hardware, software and more advanced data encryption technologies in place.

What security steps do you currently advise?

The priority is to tackle potential data theft at every stage of IoNT systems.  The best-available preventive measures should include some versions of cascaded and embedded security in the form of hardware tags and advanced encryption.

…

To end, what’s your main message for business and IT leaders?

The digital era has removed the clear line that once separated State and Business as well as People. Everything and everyone is more interconnected. We are now an ecosystem both by chance and design. Cyber-attacks can be made to afflict either one and be used to hold any one at ransom thus creating a local or even global systemic chain reaction effect.

The connected world presents endless commercial, social and environmental development opportunities…and threats. The development and deployment of emerging cyber-related technologies, in particular IoNT – which promises a market size of US$9.69 billion by 2020 – should be done responsibly in the form of infused data security technologies to ensure prolific market acceptance and profitable returns.

For our part, NanoMalaysia is working with various parties locally and abroad push Malaysia’s strategic industry sectors to be relevant to the Fourth Industrial Revolution supported by cyber-physical systems manifesting into full automation, robots, artificial intelligence, de-centralised power generation, energy storage, water and food supplies, remote assets and logistics management and custom manufacturing requiring secured data sensing, traffic and analytics systems in place.

If you have the time, I advise reading the article in its entirety.

nano tech 2017 being held in Tokyo from February 15-17, 2017

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I found some news about the Alberta technology scene in the programme for Japan’s nano tech 2017 exhibition and conference to be held Feb. 15 – 17, 2017 in Tokyo. First, here’s more about the show in Japan from a Jan. 17, 2017 nano tech 2017 press release on Business Wire (also on Yahoo News),

The nano tech executive committee (chairman: Tomoji Kawai, Specially Appointed Professor, Osaka University) will be holding “nano tech 2017” – one of the world’s largest nanotechnology exhibitions, now in its 16th year – on February 15, 2017, at the Tokyo Big Sight convention center in Japan. 600 organizations (including over 40 first-time exhibitors) from 23 countries and regions are set to exhibit at the event in 1,000 booths, demonstrating revolutionary and cutting edge core technologies spanning such industries as automotive, aerospace, environment/energy, next-generation sensors, cutting-edge medicine, and more. Including attendees at the concurrently held exhibitions, the total number of visitors to the event is expected to exceed 50,000.

The theme of this year’s nano tech exhibition is “Open Nano Collaboration.” By bringing together organizations working in a wide variety of fields, the business matching event aims to promote joint development through cross-field collaboration.

Special Symposium: “Nanotechnology Contributing to the Super Smart Society”

Each year nano tech holds Special Symposium, in which industry specialists from top organizations from Japan and abroad speak about the issues surrounding the latest trends in nanotech. The themes of this year’s Symposium are Life Nanotechnology, Graphene, AI/IoT, Cellulose Nanofibers, and Materials Informatics.

Notable sessions include:

Life Nanotechnology
“Development of microRNA liquid biopsy for early detection of cancer”
Takahiro Ochiya, National Cancer Center Research Institute Division of Molecular and Cellular Medicine, Chief

AI / IoT
“AI Embedded in the Real World”
Hideki Asoh, AIST Deputy Director, Artificial Intelligence Research Center

Cellulose Nanofibers [emphasis mine]
“The Current Trends and Challenges for Industrialization of Nanocellulose”
Satoshi Hirata, Nanocellulose Forum Secretary-General

Materials Informatics
“Perspective of Materials Research”
Hideo Hosono, Tokyo Institute of Technology Professor

View the full list of sessions:
>> http://nanotech2017.icsbizmatch.jp/Presentation/en/Info/List#main_theater

nano tech 2017 Homepage:
>> http://nanotechexpo.jp/

nano tech 2017, the 16th International Nanotechnology Exhibition & Conference
Date: February 15-17, 2017, 10:00-17:00
Venue: Tokyo Big Sight (East Halls 4-6 & Conference Tower)
Organizer: nano tech Executive Committee, JTB Communication Design

As you may have guessed the Alberta information can be found in the .Cellulose Nanofibers session. From the conference/seminar program page; scroll down about 25% of the way to find the Alberta presentation,

Production and Applications Development of Cellulose Nanocrystals (CNC) at InnoTech Alberta

Behzad (Benji) Ahvazi
InnoTech Alberta Team Lead, Cellulose Nanocrystals (CNC)

[ Abstract ]

The production and use of cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) is an emerging technology that has gained considerable interest from a range of industries that are working towards increased use of “green” biobased materials. The construction of one-of-a-kind CNC pilot plant [emphasis mine] at InnoTech Alberta and production of CNC samples represents a critical step for introducing the cellulosic based biomaterials to industrial markets and provides a platform for the development of novel high value and high volume applications. Major key components including feedstock, acid hydrolysis formulation, purification, and drying processes were optimized significantly to reduce the operation cost. Fully characterized CNC samples were provided to a large number of academic and research laboratories including various industries domestically and internationally for applications development.

[ Profile ]

Dr. Ahvazi completed his Bachelor of Science in Honours program at the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and graduated with distinction at Concordia University in Montréal, Québec. His Ph.D. program was completed in 1998 at McGill Pulp and Paper Research Centre in the area of macromolecules with solid background in Lignocellulosic, organic wood chemistry as well as pulping and paper technology. After completing his post-doctoral fellowship, he joined FPInnovations formally [formerly?] known as PAPRICAN as a research scientist (R&D) focusing on a number of confidential chemical pulping and bleaching projects. In 2006, he worked at Tembec as a senior research scientist and as a Leader in Alcohol and Lignin (R&D). In April 2009, he held a position as a Research Officer in both National Bioproducts (NBP1 & NBP2) and Industrial Biomaterials Flagship programs at National Research Council Canada (NRC). During his tenure, he had directed and performed innovative R&D activities within both programs on extraction, modification, and characterization of biomass as well as polymer synthesis and formulation for industrial applications. Currently, he is working at InnoTech Alberta as Team Lead for Biomass Conversion and Processing Technologies.

Canada scene update

InnoTech Alberta was until Nov. 1, 2016 known as Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures. Here’s more about InnoTech Alberta from the Alberta Innovates … home page,

Effective November 1, 2016, Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures is one of four corporations now consolidated into Alberta Innovates and a wholly owned subsidiary called InnoTech Alberta.

You will find all the existing programs, services and information offered by InnoTech Alberta on this website. To access the basic research funding and commercialization programs previously offered by Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures, explore here. For more information on Alberta Innovates, visit the new Alberta Innovates website.

As for InnoTech Alberta’s “one-of-a-kind CNC pilot plant,” I’d like to know more about it’s one-of-a-kind status since there are two other CNC production plants in Canada. (Is the status a consequence of regional chauvinism or a writer unfamiliar with the topic?). Getting back to the topic, the largest company (and I believe the first) with a CNC plant was CelluForce, which started as a joint venture between Domtar and FPInnovations and powered with some very heavy investment from the government of Canada. (See my July 16, 2010 posting about the construction of the plant in Quebec and my June 6, 2011 posting about the newly named CelluForce.) Interestingly, CelluForce will have a booth at nano tech 2017 (according to its Jan. 27, 2017 news release) although the company doesn’t seem to have any presentations on the schedule. The other Canadian company is Blue Goose Biorefineries in Saskatchewan. Here’s more about Blue Goose from the company website’s home page,

Blue Goose Biorefineries Inc. (Blue Goose) is pleased to introduce our R3TM process. R3TM technology incorporates green chemistry to fractionate renewable plant biomass into high value products.

Traditionally, separating lignocellulosic biomass required high temperatures, harsh chemicals, and complicated processes. R3TM breaks this costly compromise to yield high quality cellulose, lignin and hemicellulose products.

The robust and environmentally friendly R3TM technology has numerous applications. Our current product focus is cellulose nanocrystals (CNC). Cellulose nanocrystals are “Mother Nature’s Building Blocks” possessing unique properties. These unique properties encourage the design of innovative products from a safe, inherently renewable, sustainable, and carbon neutral resource.

Blue Goose assists companies and research groups in the development of applications for CNC, by offering CNC for sale without Intellectual Property restrictions. [emphasis mine]

Bravo to Blue Goose! Unfortunately, I was not able to determine if the company will be at nano tech 2017.

One final comment, there was some excitement about CNC a while back where I had more than one person contact me asking for information about how to buy CNC. I wasn’t able to be helpful because there was, apparently, an attempt by producers to control sales and limit CNC access to a select few for competitive advantage. Coincidentally or not, CelluForce developed a stockpile which has persisted for some years as I noted in my Aug. 17, 2016 posting (scroll down about 70% of the way) where the company announced amongst other events that it expected deplete its stockpile by mid-2017.