Spin-Based Magneto-Electric Transistor Could Shave Five Percent Off the World's Energy Needs

A team of scientists from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and University at Buffalo have demonstrated a novel type of transistor, based on magneto-electric operation, which could cut five percent off the world's energy needs.

"The implications of this most recent demonstration are profound," claims co-author Peter Dowben, professor of physics and astronomy, of the work. "We’re getting to the point where we’re going to approach the previous energy consumption of the United States just for memory [alone]. And it doesn't stop. So you need something that you can shrink smaller, if possible. But above all, you need something that works differently than a silicon transistor, so that you can drop the power consumption, a lot."

That's precisely what the team claims to have created: a new type of transistor, which scales down to smaller feature sizes than current designs while requiring less power. Based on a layered design featuring chromium oxide and graphene, the transistor operates via spin rather than electron charges — which means it only requires a major input of energy when changing states, in contrast to dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) components that require constant refreshing.

In experimentation, the team found the spin-transistor yielded an easily-detectable signal depending on whether a positive or negative voltage had been applied. "This potentially gives you huge fidelity at very little energy cost," says Dowben. "All you did was apply voltage, and it flipped."

Having proven the concept, the long process of improving the design begins. "Now that it works, the fun begins, because everybody’s going to have their own favorite 2D material, and they’re going to try it out,” Dowben explains. “Some of them will work a lot, lot better, and some won’t. But now that you know it works, it's worth investing in those other, more sophisticated materials that could. Now everybody can get into the game, figuring out how to make the transistor really good and competitive and, indeed, exceed silicon."

The team's work has been published in the journal Advanced Materials under closed-access terms.

Main article image courtesy of the University at Buffalo and Advanced Materials.