As electronic devices have grown smaller and more powerful, new thermal management methods have been created to help prevent them from overheating; however, researchers and engineers are in a constant race to come up with new methods to adequately manage the increasing amount of heat being generated by shrinking next-generation devices.
Now, scientists at University of Buffalo have released research that suggests nanodevices may be able to protect themselves from heat generation while simultaneously boosting computing power without the need for significant structural changes to electronic devices.
“We’ve found that it’s possible to protect nanoelectronic devices from the heat they generate in a way that preserves how these devices function,” Jonathan Bird, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Buffalo and co-lead author of the study, said. “This will hopefully allow us to continue developing more powerful smartphones, tablets and other devices without having a fundamental meltdown in their operation due to overheating.”
The team fabricated nanoscale semiconductor devices in a state-of-the-art gallium arsenide crystal and subjected the chip to a large voltage, which pushed an electrical current through the nanoconductors and subsequently increased the amount of heat circulating through the chip’s nanotransistor. The device did not degrade as expected when exposed to the larger amount of heat, however, instead transforming itself into a quantum state that was protected from the heat while continuing to provide a robust channel of electric current. Bird likened the experiment’s results to an analogy of Niagara Falls.
“The water, or energy, comes from a source; in this case, the Great Lakes. It’s channeled into a narrow point (the Niagara River) and ultimately flows over Niagara Falls. At the bottom of the waterfall is dissipated energy. But unlike the waterfall, this dissipated energy recirculates throughout the chip and changes how heat affects, or in this case doesn’t affect, the network’s operation,” he explained.
This unusual behavior is the direct result of the quantum mechanical nature of electronics when viewed on the nanoscale, says Bird, adding that the electrons in the current spontaneously organize to form a narrow conducting filament through the nanoconductor. It is this filament that is so durable against the effects of heating.
“We’re not actually eliminating the heat, but we’ve managed to stop it from affecting the electrical network. In a way, this is an optimization of the current paradigm,” Jong Han, University of Buffalo associate professor of physics and co-lead author of the study, explained.
The research paper, “Formation of a protected sub-band for conduction in quantum point contacts under extreme biasing,” is published the journal Nature Nanotechnology.
