American engineer, Intel co-founder and chairman emeritus Gordon Moore stated in 1965 that the number of transistors per silicon chip will double every 12 to 24 months! The computer industry calls it Moore’s Law. His law has been extended to other technologies including memory chips. Moore’s Law has been referenced for the last five decades in developing smaller and faster silicon wafer chips. However, about five years ago, many scientists and engineers felt Moore’s Law had come to an end as engineers couldn’t keep increasing the components in computer processor or memory chips without drastically increasing the chip size.
Bob Larson
Three German physicists from German companies TRUMPF, ZEISS and the Fraunhofer IOF, proved the industry wrong last year by announcing their EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) lithography technology. This is the process of projecting an image on to a silicon wafer before it is converted into a computer chip and enables many future applications such as automated driving, 5G, Artificial Intelligence and other future innovations. The three German scientists won several German awards for their innovation and could become future Nobel prize recipients.
Using EUV light to carve transistors in silicon wafers will lead to microprocessors that will be 100 times faster than today’s most powerful chips, and in memory chips with similar increases in storage capacity. This is comparable to a microchip that is smaller than a fingertip, but has the capacity to accommodate more than fifteen billion transistors.
Samsung and many other worldwide electronics manufacturers have recently announced new products using the EUV technology for their different products such as 5G smartphones, faster computers, Smarter TVs, more AI products, driverless vehicles, healthcare products, and so on.
This is another great use of technology helping our human population lead better lives! Bob Larson is a technologist and Marketing Director for 50 Plus.