Nano-Transistors For The Next-Generation RAM-Modul

MicAttAck writes: "This Heise-Article (in German: use your Fish in the ear) reports: Scientists of the University of Essen have developed a method to arrange gold-55-nano-clusters. These gold-clusters (so called quantum-points) are the building blocks for nano-transistors. Because of the special properties of these clusters, they can actually hold an electron (normally gold leads electric current very well). They release the electron when they are "sucked out" by electric voltage. The gold-clusters are coated with a special plastic to insulate them and to achieve a structured arrangement. The two chemists Monika Baeumle and Norbert Beyer who developed this got an award yesterday (2000-05-18) for their achievement. "

Great, but long way off ?

[getha]

Okay, so they've found a ( or another ) way to - possibly - produce higher capacity, faster memory.
But then again, all they've managed to do as far as I can make up from the ( at some points funny ) babelfish translation is to get tiny coated gold-pellets to retain electrons until queried... Okay, so you've got a few ( or maybe just one? ) bits to play with. That's still a long, long way off from a 128 MB module, ain't it?

And also: come on guys! Gold, for crying out loud! Why not just use platinum if you're going to go expensive... I mean, then just do it right, right?
What the hell will you have to lay down for one of these? For materials alone you'd have to pay a pretty buck, I suppose.


xchg .,@

Re:Great, but long way off ?

[dbarclay10]

Hey, come on! Relax, man. If all these technologies come together some day, we'll be able to produce gold en masse :)

Dave

Re:Great, but long way off ?

[sweet reason]

And also: come on guys! Gold, for crying out loud! Why not just use platinum if you're going to go expensive... I mean, then just do it right, right?
What the hell will you have to lay down for one of these? For materials alone you'd have to pay a pretty buck, I suppose.

that gold is measured in number of atoms per cell. there will be a lot more gold coating the connectors on a memory module than in the memory chips themselves.

Re:Great, but long way off ?

[Cyberllama]

Gold is a common component in computer parts. An old pentium or 486 is probably worth more in gold than what you could sell to for anyone. They are talking about very small amounts of gold from what I could understand anyways. :)

Wow!

[sanemind]

Although I suspect that holographic storage is closer to realizaability in the immidiate future, near-atomic-scale memory is an awesome possiblility! The quantitities of gold invloved shouldn't unduly effect the price if the stuff can ever be mass produced. I imagine that refresh is still a problem, however. If you're interested, check out scientific american's article on molecular computing at: http://www.sciam.com/2000/0600issue/0600reed.html Amazing stuff! [May moore's law never die!]

Re:Great, but long way off ?

[Gosvami]

And, gold and electricity are great bedfellows, as the original article stated. Undoubtedly they chose gold for the reason that it interacts with electricity better than anything else.