Year after year, semiconductor manufacturers scale down the size of components, making processors faster and more efficient. However, we're approaching the limits of atomic scale with silicon, leading some to wonder if Moore's Law really is dead. A new computing revolution in the works may take us beyond transistors with atomic-scale magnets.

Some computer science researchers have promoted quantum computing as the next logical step. These systems can go beyond binary computing with qubits representing 0, 1, or both. The proposed magnetic computing system can allegedly offer a similar generational increase in computation while still using the established binary states of 0 and 1.

The technology proposed by the international team is based on a new type of magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ), but an MTJ is not new to computing. An MTJ is simply a pair of ferromagnetic layers separated by an insulator. We already see this mechanism in components like radio-frequency sensors, magnetic RAM, and hard drive read heads that control the spin states of magnetic materials, a technique known as spintronics.

The paper, published in the journal Nature Communications, describes the construction of MTJs that act like tiny 2D magnets representing 0 or 1. That means they can be used as logic gates in a computer. The ultra-fast switching possible with spintronics means a processor utilizing this technology can be much faster and more efficient than the transistors used today, according to LiveScience.

While the potential for this technology is immense, it's not terribly practical right now, requiring a convergence of exotic materials and conditions. The 2D magnet MTJs (sometimes called van der Waals magnets) are composed of layers of chromium triiodide, flakes of graphene, and hexagonal boron nitride. The assemblage is then cooled to near absolute zero. When passing 16-millisecond bursts of electrical current through the junction, the researchers noted they could switch the polarization of the magnets from spin-parallel to spin-antiparallel states. These states can be used to represent 0 and 1.

The vastly smaller scale and speed of the MTJ switching mean that engineers could design chips around these components that require an order of magnitude less processing power. However, the current requirement of operating at extremely low temperatures limits practical utility. Even if refinements don't completely remove that limitation, 2D magnetic logic gates could still find use in servers and high-performance computing environments.

By: DocMemory
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