HP-MemristorsIntoProduction-EventualTransistorReplacement?

[MitchJi]

Hi,

Interesting articles from BBC (links and excerpts below):
Article from 2008 explaining the technology including a video here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7377063.stm

last updated at 10:14 GMT, Thursday, 1 May 2008 11:14 UK
Electronics' 'missing link' found

Hewlett-Packard's Stan Williams helped develop 'memristors'

Details of an entirely new kind of electronic device, which could make chips smaller and far more efficient, have been outlined by scientists.

The new components, described by scientists at Hewlett-Packard, are known as "memristors".

They have already been used to build novel transistors - tiny switches that are the building blocks of all chips.

"Now we have this type of device we have a broader palette with which to paint our circuits," Professor Stan Williams, one of the team, told the BBC last year.

Memristors were first proposed in 1971 by Professor Leon Chua, a scientist at the University of California, Berkeley.

They are the "fourth" basic building block of circuits, after capacitors, resistors and inductors.

The memristors are so called because they have the ability to "remember" the amount of charge that has flowed through them after the power has been switched off.

This could allow researchers to build new kinds of computer memory that would would not require powering up.

Today, most PCs use dynamic random access memory (DRAM) which loses data when the power is turned off.

But a computer built with memristors could allow PCs that start up instantly, laptops that retain sessions after the battery dies, or mobile phones that can last for weeks without needing a charge.

Professor Williams and his team have already shown that by putting two memristors together - a configuration called a crossbar latch - it could do the job of a transistor.

"A crossbar latch has the type of functionality you want from a transistor but it's working with very different physics," he explained.

Intriguingly, these devices can also be made much smaller than a conventional transistor.

"And as they get smaller they get better," he said.

An article from 2010 with more information:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8609885.stm

last updated at 18:49 GMT, Thursday, 8 April 2010 19:49 UK
Hewlett Packard outlines computer memory of the future

17 memristors captured by an atomic force microscope

The fundamental building blocks of all computing devices could be about to undergo a dramatic change that would allow faster, more efficient machines.

Researchers at computer firm Hewlett Packard (HP) have shown off working devices built using memristors - often described as electronics' missing link.

These tiny devices were proposed 40 years ago but only fabricated in 2008.

HP says it has now shown that they can be used to crunch data, meaning they could be used to build advanced chips.

That means they could begin to replace transistors - the tiny switches used to build today's chips.

And, crucially, the unique properties of memristors would allow future chips to both store and process data in the same device.

Today, these functions are done on separate devices, meaning data must be transferred between the two, slowing down the computation and wasting energy.

Today, these functions are done on separate devices, meaning data must be transferred between the two, slowing down the computation and wasting energy.

"The processor and memory could be exactly the same thing," Dr Stan Williams of HP told BBC News. "That allows us to think differently about how computation could be done."

Professor Leon Chua - the first person to propose memristors - said the work was "conceptually, just the tip of the iceberg".

He compared the devices to the human brain's synapses and axons.

"In the near future we can use memristors to make real brain-like computers, he told BBC News.

Researchers at the University of Michigan recently showed that the devices can mimic synaptic activity in the brain.

The devices get their name from their ability to "remember" the amount of charge that has flowed through them after the power has been switched off.

This means they are suited for building computer memory and storage; an application that Dr Williams believes could be on the market within three years.

"Our immediate goal is to make a competitor to flash memory for cameras, iPods and devices like that," said Dr Williams.

"Our aspiration is for it to have twice as much available memory as an equivalent sized flash memory device."

The team has also shown that the memristors can be stacked on top of each other to form 3-D arrays.

"In theory we can connect thousands of layers in a very straightforward fashion," said Dr Williams.

"It could provide a way of getting a ridiculous amount of memory on a chip."

Currently, chip makers follow a path defined by Moore's Law, which states that the number of transistors it is possible to squeeze in to a chip for a fixed cost doubles every two years.

This is currently achieved by producing transistors with ever smaller feature sizes. Current cutting edge chips have transistors with feature sizes as small as 22 nanometres (22 billionths of a metre).

But this miniaturisation cannot continue forever, experts say.

Memristors offer an alternative path.

"We can continue to make them smaller even past the point where people think that transistors cannot shrink any further," said Dr Williams.

Crucially, said Dr Williams, they can be built using "materials commonly available in any fab [chip fabrication plant]".

Dr Williams said he had already made "crude" prototypes with features as small as 3nm.

"The functional equivalent of Moore's Law could go on for decades after we hit the wall where we can no longer shrink transistors," he said.

Current article announcing plans for production:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11165087

2 September 2010 Last updated at 11:33 ET
Electronics giant HP has joined the world's second-largest memory chip maker Hynix to manufacture a novel member of the electronics family.

The deal will see "memristors" - first demonstrated by HP in 2006 - mass produced for the first time.

They are considered to be the "missing link" in electronics, a fourth element to supplement the more familiar resistor, capacitor and inductor that together form the basis of every electronic device yet made.

In short, it is a resistor with memory: applying an electric voltage can change how much the device blocks electric current - and memristors can "remember" that level - even when the power is turned off.

That makes it a candidate for memory that requires little energy to store information - like the current standard for non-volatile memory, Flash.

"Memristor memory chips promise to run at least 10 times faster and use 10 times less power than an equivalent Flash memory chip," said Stan Williams, the HP Fellow who first demonstrated the memristor, in a statement by the firm.
Continue reading the main story

Memristors can also in principle be used in logic circuits, replacing the actions of the billions of transistors that make up a modern microprocessor - but indications are that will require significant further development.

Steve Furber, professor of computer engineering at the University of Manchester, explained that the potential benefits lie in the fact that memristors are "much simpler in principle than transistors".

"Because they are formed as a film between two wires, they don't have to be implanted into the silicon surface - as do transistors, which form the storage locations in Flash - so they could be built in layers in 3D," he told BBC News.

"Of course, the devil is in the detail, and I don't think the manufacturing challenges have been fully exposed yet."

The joint effort between HP and Hynix will aim to develop memristor memory chips known as resistive random access memory (ReRAM), with an aim to have the first products ready by 2013.

 

[MitchJi]

Hi,

Excellent explanations:
[youtube]rvA5r4LtVnc[/youtube]

6-Minute Memristor Guide
R. Stanley Williams, whose team discovered the memristor (the fourth fundamental circuit element) gives us a quick whiteboard talk about how the device works.

[youtube]wZAHG3COYYA[/youtube]

Mark my words, this will VASTLY change the world... The memristor is the fourth element in integrated circuitry. Scientists are discovering the mathematic equations used to govern memristors are similiar to those which govern synapses in the brain.

In addition, memristors do not "forget" the voltage charge channeled through them. This will yeild several billion-fold times the capacity/performance than current hard drives. That, however, is just one of the multitude of products yet to utilize this incredible new discovery.