Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!ncis.llnl.gov!helios.ee.lbl.gov!nosc!ucsd!rutgers!apple!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!mit-amt!mit-caf!chu
From: chu@mit-caf.MIT.EDU (Bill Chu)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: TI announcement
Keywords: quantum effect transistor
Message-ID: <1749@mit-caf.MIT.EDU>
Date: 22 Jan 89 02:49:27 GMT
References: <11462@haddock.ima.isc.com> <5621@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Reply-To: chu@mit-caf.UUCP (Bill Chu)
Organization: Quantum Effect Electronics Group, MIT
Lines: 24

In article <5621@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> mbkennel@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Matthew B. Kennel) writes:
>In article <11462@haddock.ima.isc.com) suitti@haddock.ima.isc.com (Stephen Uitti) writes:
>)TEXAS INSTRUMENTS has fabricated the first quantum effect transistor.
>)The device, called a bipolar resonant tunneling transistor, has active
>)regions measuring 0.01-0.02 microns and offers the possibility of
>)switching speeds 1,000 times faster than today's best semiconductor
>)devices.
>
>0.01-0.02 um?????  Just how _did_ they make it?

Apparently, the device is a three terminal resonant tunneling structure
with a GaAs layer sandwiched between two AlGaAs layers.  The structure
is grown by molecular beam epitaxy.  I'm not sure how they make a 
connection to the thin GaAs layer.  

>Matt Kennel

                                       -- Bill
----------------------------------------------------------------------
William Chu                       ARPA Internet: chu@caf.mit.edu  
MIT Microsystems Technology       UUCP: {harvard,rutgers,seismo}
   Laboratory, 39-655                    !mit-eddie!mit-caf!chu
Cambridge, MA 02139               Phone: (617)253-0722                  
----------------------------------------------------------------------