What actually is nano electronics?\u00a0 The semiconductor people have been working with features that are 100 nm or smaller for close to 20 years.\u00a0 The current generation of semiconductors are classified as being 32 nm or smaller.<\/p>\n
So we have transistor and other components that are sub-100 nm.\u00a0 Does that classify as nano-electronics?\u00a0 Or are they nano-electronic components?\u00a0 What classifies something as electronics?\u00a0 Is it the function as a system or only constituent parts?\u00a0 If the term refers to the system, the development of nanoscale electronics is significantly more challenging.<\/p>\n
Consider the elements of a system.\u00a0 The system must do something, whether it is measure a variable, record some data, provide an output, and survive in its environment.\u00a0 Consider an electronic-based thermometer.\u00a0 The device must measure temperature, which can be accomplished by a variety of means, current flow in thermally sensitive resistor, deflection of a gauge, etc.\u00a0 Once the device makes this measurement, it must record the measurement or display it.\u00a0 Of course, these electronics must be packaged in some kind of container. \u00a0Being electronics, the system requires power from somewhere.\u00a0 It could be from a battery inside the package.\u00a0 Let\u2019s start with the existing state-of-the-art in small batteries.<\/p>\n
Small batteries have been in the news this year.\u00a0 NBCNews Technology [1] has a picture of a wireless medical implant that is roughly the size of a grain of rice.\u00a0 The battery, which is part of the package, has a wireless connection capability for recharging it so that the device can be kept functioning.\u00a0 ExtremeTech [2] has an article on graphene based battery that is also roughly the size of a grain of rice.\u00a0 ScienceDaily [3] had an article on a battery small enough to be injected.\u00a0 The picture in the article shows the battery to be about the length of a grain of rice but slightly larger in diameter.\u00a0 From these and other releases, one can surmise that the length of a grain of rice is the smallest battery size in production today.<\/p>\n
What are the dimensions of a grain of rice?\u00a0 Rice grain are a function of two characteristics.\u00a0 The first one is the length, which can range from under 6.2 mm for short grain to over 6.6 mm for long grain rice.\u00a0 The second characteristic is the ratio of the length to the diameter.\u00a0 This ranges from 3.1 for long grain to 1.9 for milled rice.\u00a0 For an approximation, one can consider the grain of rice to be 6 mm by 2mm.\u00a0 Consider that at the nanoscale.\u00a0 The dimensions are 6,000,000 nm by 2,000,000 nm!\u00a0 That is not small. And, that is only the battery not the rest of the electronics that needs to be included in the package.\u00a0 Consequently, reducing the size of the power for the electronics will be a major challenge.\u00a0 Other portions of the nano-electronics will be covered in future blogs.\u00a0 We have a long way to go to get to true nanoscale electronic systems.<\/p>\n
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[1] http:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/tech\/innovation\/woireless-medical-implan-smaller-grain-rice-n109431<\/a><\/p>\n