Moores Law needs More.
  04/15/2001 5:20:45 PM MDT Albuquerque, Nm
  By Dustin D. Brand; Owner AMO

Advanced Lithography and Moores Law colide.   The semiconductor industry is built on a simple axiom: Every 18 to 24 months a chip's power doubles, as scientists cram twice as many circuits onto semiconductor material.

  This rule, known as Moore's Law, is named after Intel co-founder Gordon Moore, who charted it in 1965. By the end of this decade, Moore's hard-and-fast rule is in danger of breaking down in the face of the laws of physics.

  Fortunately for the companies involved, constant innovation in the industry has given them hope, and up to now Moore has been right on (well more than right on). The growth in chip sales is tied to a chip company's ability to make steady leaps in performance, turning yesterday's supercomputers into today's desktop machines.

  By now, most of you have seen the picture of the room full of computers taken 30+ years ago. Now, and in course with Moores Law, that whole rooms Computer Power can fit in a Digital Watch, Dick Tracey Style.

  I remember speeking with my Friend Mike about this back in July of 1999, when I told him where we should be by 2002 in Microns, or the die size of a Silicon Wafer.

  As I stated back in July of 1999 to my friend Mike, Silicon has a barrier. Silicon Dioxide is currently used in Semiconductor Manufacturing to create the area on the surface that controls the flow of electricity on a transistor. Layers of Silicon Dioxide less than 3 nanometers become less efficient, in exacting terms having these areas so close in relation to one another causes interferance making computations non exacting. Scientists have been working on this problem for nearly 4 years now, with one solution being Barium Titanium Oxide on Magnesium Oxide, each layer forming from the crystaline matrix below it. These Silicon Barrier breakers will most likely be used in field effect transistors as switching devices.

  Here in Albuquerque, NM at Sandia National Laboratories, Advanced Lithography aptly named "Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography or EUV", is the next current hope for Moores Law taking us well into year 2007. Intel, IBM, AMD, Motorola, and many others including our own US Government-hence being developed here in town at Sandia National Labs, are funding the prototype which is nearly ready for production.

  Still using Solid State Physics, the EUV works by using a solid state laser which generates short-wavelength radiation by interacting with a xenon gas jet. The Optics then direct the radiation to draw the circuit patterns onto wafers of semiconductor material. This new process will take us below the .1 Micron process which is the current barrier, having only 1 Company in the World, NVIDIA producing anything near it with their XBOX GPU cast at .15 micron. The XBOX GPU doesn't use the EUV because it isn't out yet, but slated to be in the hands of Intel and the others mentioned before 2002 though some say 2005. This next generation of Computer Chips at less than 0.1 micron will yeild 100x more power than todays, with 1000 times more capacity.

  Moores Law will last to at least 2007, however 2007-2020 will be a true technological revolution looking in retrospect to the room full of computers that now fit into a watch multiplied by a magnitude of 100. In many aspects, Moores law has gone much faster than even he predicted, in my humble opinion at times taking only 9 months, but now just keeping in step with 18 months requires a whole new Physics beyond 2007.   Now though, keeping pace with Moore's Law requires an incredible amount of effort.

  IBM and Nikon are also spearheading research of a different kind, hoping to use streams of electrons, rather than light, to print circuits on semiconductor material.

  For engineers at Intel, however, the most promising method for high-volume manufacturing involves ultraviolet light. With this technology, Moore's Law should continue at least through 2010, said Intel spokesman Manny Vara.

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