Explained: Quantum engineering
Quantum computers could usher in a golden age of computing power, solving problems intractable on today’s machines.
Discovery suggests new promise for nonsilicon computer transistors
Once deemed suitable only for high-speed communication systems, an alloy called InGaAs might one day rival silicon in high-performance computing.
Lighting up the ion trap
Fiber optics built into a chip can deliver all the laser light needed to control ions for quantum computing and sensing.
Integrating optical components into existing chip designs
Technique would allow addition of optical communication components to existing chips with little modification of their designs.
Practical parallelism
System enables large speedups — as much as 88-fold — on common parallel-computing algorithms.
Commercializing integrated photonics
AIM Photonics fall meeting attendees tackle plans for making computer chips with integrated optical devices and developing a regional workforce.
Researchers unveil experimental 36-core chip
Design lets chip manage local memory stores efficiently using an Internet-style communication network.
Parallel programming may not be so daunting
“Lock-free” parallel algorithms may match performance of more complex “wait-free” algorithms.
How to program unreliable chips
A new language lets coders reason about the trade-off between fidelity of execution and power or time savings in the computers of the future.
Managing multicore memory
MIT research shows that it may be time to let software, rather than hardware, manage the high-speed on-chip memory banks known as ‘caches.’
Surprising turns in magnetic thin films could lead to better data storage
MIT researchers discover efficient control of magnetism in chiral ferromagnets.
Researchers demonstrate record-setting p-type transistor
New design for a basic component of all computer chips boasts the highest ‘carrier mobility’ yet measured.
Tiny compound semiconductor transistor could challenge silicon’s dominance
MIT researchers develop the smallest indium gallium arsenide transistor ever built.
Simulating tomorrow’s chips
A new system makes hardware models of multicore chips more efficient, easier to design and more reliable.
Chips as mini Internets
The data-routing techniques that undergird the Internet could increase the efficiency of multicore chips while lowering their power requirements.