[NJARC] Mr. Transistor's 60th Anniversary

[John Ruccolo]

Hi Folks,

A couple of weeks old, but a good story on the 60th
anniversary of that little three-legged MONSTER.

JR

^BC-Transistor Anniversary, 1st Ld-Writethru,

^As transistor turns 60, Moore's Law is tested anew

^By JORDAN ROBERTSON=
^AP Technology Writer=
   SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) _ Sixty years after
transistors were
invented and nearly five decades since they were first
integrated
into silicon chips, the tiny on-off switches dubbed
the ``nerve
cells'' of the information age are starting to show
their age.
   The devices _ whose miniaturization over time set
in motion the
race for faster, smaller and cheaper electronics _
have been shrunk
so much that the day is approaching when it will be
physically
impossible to make them even tinier.
   Once chip makers can't squeeze any more into the
same-sized
slice of silicon, the dramatic performance gains and
cost
reductions in computing over the years could suddenly
slow. And the
engine that's driven the digital revolution _ and
modern economy _
could grind to a halt.
   Even Gordon Moore, the Intel Corp. co-founder who
famously
predicted in 1965 that the number of transistors on a
chip should
double every two years, sees that the end is fast
approaching _ an
outcome the chip industry is scrambling to avoid.
   ``I can see (it lasting) another decade or so,'' he
said of the
axiom now known as Moore's Law. ``Beyond that, things
look tough.
But that's been the case many times in the past.''
   Preparing for the day they can't add more
transistors, chip
companies are pouring billions of dollars into
plotting new ways to
use the existing transistors, instructing them to
behave in
different and more powerful ways.
   Intel, the world's largest semiconductor company,
predicts that
a number of ``highly speculative'' alternative
technologies, such
as quantum computing, optical switches and other
methods, will be
needed to continue Moore's Law beyond 2020.
   ``Things are changing much faster now, in this
current period,
than they did for many decades,'' said Intel Chief
Technology
Officer Justin Rattner. ``The pace of change is
accelerating
because we're approaching a number of different
physical limits at
the same time. We're really working overtime to make
sure we can
continue to follow Moore's Law.''
   Transistors work something like light switches,
flipping on and
off inside a chip to generate the ones and zeros that
store and
process information inside a computer.
   The transistor was invented by scientists William
Shockley, John
Bardeen and Walter Brattain to amplify voices in
telephones for a
Bell Labs project, an effort for which they later
shared the Nobel
Prize in physics.
   On Dec. 16, 1947, Bardeen and Brattain created the
first
transistor. The next month, on Jan. 23, 1948,
Shockley, a member of
the same research group, invented another type, which
went on to
become the preferred transistor because it was easier
to
manufacture.
   Transistors' ever-decreasing size and low power
consumption made
them an ideal candidate to replace the bulky vacuum
tubes then used
to amplify electrical signals and switch electrical
currents. AT&T
saw them as a replacement for clattering telephone
switches.
   Transistors eventually found their way into
portable radios and
other electronic devices, and are most prominently
used today as
the building blocks of integrated circuits, another
Nobel
Prize-winning invention that is the foundation of
microprocessors,
memory chips and other kinds of semiconductor devices.
   Since the invention of the integrated circuit in
the late 1950s
_ separately by Texas Instruments Inc.'s Jack Kilby
and future
Intel co-founder Robert Noyce _ the pace of innovation
has been
scorching.
   The number of transistors on microprocessors _ the
brains of
computers _ has leaped from just several thousand in
the 1970s to
nearly a billion today, a staggering feat that has
unleashed
previously unimagined computing power.
   ``I think (the transistor) is going to be around
for a long
time,'' Moore said. ``There have been ideas about how
people are
going to replace it, and it's always dangerous to
predict something
won't happen, but I don't see anything coming along
that would
really replace the transistor.''
   But there have been considerable stumbling blocks
in recent
years.
   One problem has been trying to prevent too much
heat from
escaping from thinner-and-thinner components. That has
led chip
companies to look for new materials and other ways to
improve
performance.
   Earlier this year, Intel and IBM Corp. separately
announced that
they discovered a way to boost transistor efficiency.
   The solution involves replacing the silicon dioxide
used for
more than 40 years as an insulator, but has since been
shaved too
thin, with various metals in parts called the gate,
which turns the
transistor on and off, and the gate dielectric, an
insulating
layer, which helps improve transistor performance and
retain
energy.
   Still more novel ways to prevent electricity
leakage _ and other
problems _ are being pursued. And nobody has won a bet
against
maintaining the pace of innovation in technology.
   ``The only thing that's been predicted more
frequently than
Moore's Law has been its demise _ everybody's been
wrong,'' said
Sun Microsystems Inc. Chief Technology Officer Greg
Papadopoulos.
``It's a pretty robust set of observations and really
it's about
techno-economics ... It's a dangerous thing to bet
against because
of the economic investment cycle that's in there.''
   
   AP-ES-12-16-07 0000EST




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