Slashdot Mirror


A Plasmonic Revolution for Computer Chips?

Roland Piquepaille writes "Today, we're using basically two ways to move data in our computers: transistors carry small amounts of data and are extremely small, while fiber optic cables can carry huge amounts of data, but are much bigger in size. Now, imagine a single technology combining the advantages of photonics and electronics. This Stanford University report says a new technology can do it: plasmonics. (For more about plasmons, read this Wikipedia article.) Theoretically, it is possible to design plasmonic components with the same materials used today by chipmakers, but with frequencies 100,000 times greater than the ones of current microprocessors. There is still a challenge to solve before getting plasmonic chips. Today, plasmons can only travel a few millimeters before dying, while today's chips are typically about a centimeter across. Read this overview for more details and references about plasmonics, and to discover why it's one possible future for chips' circuitry."

188 comments

  1. Not a plasmonic mirror by winkydink · · Score: 0, Redundant

    But a mirror for links:

    Roland Piquepaille writes "Today, we're using basically two ways to move data in our computers: transistors carry small amounts of data and are extremely small, while fiber optic cables can carry huge amounts of data, but are much bigger in size. Now, imagine a single technology combining the advantages of photonics and electronics. This Stanford University report says a new technology can do it: plasmonics. (For more about plasmons, read this Wikipedia article.) Theoretically, it is possible to design plasmonic components with the same materials used today by chipmakers, but with frequencies 100,000 times greater than the ones of current microprocessors. There is still a challenge to solve before getting plasmonic chips. Today, plasmons can only travel a few millimeters before dying, while today's chips are typically about a centimeter across. Read this overview for more details and references about plasmonics, and to discover why it's one possible future for chips' circuitry."

    --

    "I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey

    1. Re:Not a plasmonic mirror by iamzack · · Score: 1, Interesting

      If the frequency is 100,000 times that of current CPUs, the chip could be more simplistic because it could process more instructions per second.

      I don't know how much fat you'd have to trim to get it down to a "few millimeters." So a few could be 3 or 4 milimeters which would be .3 or .4 centimeters, so 30 to 40% the size of today's current CPUs, operating at 100,000 times the frequency. I suppose you could even do the dual core thing and have 60-80% of the size of a normal CPU. OR....

      While an all-plasmonic chip might be feasible someday, Brongersma expects that in the near term, plasmonic wires will act as high-traffic freeways on chips with otherwise conventional electronics.

      That sounds more feasible than building an entire chip in this fashion. Just plug it in where you need it.

      My money is still on carbon nanotubes, though.

    2. Re:Not a plasmonic mirror by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You people are hypocrites, you complain about Roland copying other people's work, then you go and copy his. If you don't want to support Roland don't click his link, period.

    3. Re:Not a plasmonic mirror by winkydink · · Score: 1

      You people? What "people" are you referring to?

      --

      "I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey

  2. Alright by OverlordQ · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Lets keep it simple, put all of the Roland Piquepaille conspiracy posts here. :)

    Editors: GIVE HIM HIS OWN DAMN SECTION SO CAN HIDE HIS POSTS

    --
    Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
    1. Re:Alright by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      Why would we hide his posts? They're interesting, and cost me the same to read as any other (non-reg) Slashdot linked stories: nothing. That said, I would like a feature that lets us block stories by submitter on our own Slashdot pages.

      --

      --
      make install -not war

    2. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It's not that we need a "Roland Piquepaille" section; it's that we need the ability to filter stories by submitter.

    3. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why create a new section? This one will do just fine.

    4. Re:Alright by CSMastermind · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      In the mean time we can spread the word about what he's doing, not visit his site (I blocked it at our school) and say, "Thank you for the information, it's neat now I'm going to google the topic and find out about it".

    5. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Request a 'filter story by submitter' feature here.

    6. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You blocked access to his site at your school? That's just silly, you should work for the Chinese government, you would fit right in. Let people make their own decisions, I choose not to click on his articles, but I don't impose my view upon anyone else.

    7. Re:Alright by Stalyn · · Score: 4, Funny

      i'll take Roland Piquepaille over Jon Katz any day.

      --
      The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education. - Paul Feyerabend
    8. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Blocking many people's access to a web-site based on your personal opinion is censorship and is, in my opinion, a bad idea. You can educate people about what he is doing and your opinion about it, but removing other people's freedom of access to information is unethical.

    9. Re:Alright by NanoGator · · Score: 1

      "Editors: GIVE HIM HIS OWN DAMN SECTION SO CAN HIDE HIS POSTS"

      That'll never happen. Every time a Roland story pops on, a bunch of twerps come in and bitch about it. For every bitch-post, there's an ad served. For every ad served, bling bling in Slashdot's pocket.

      If you guys would take off your tard hats for a moment, you'd discover that the best way to get rid of the guy is to simply stay out of his threads.

      --
      "Derp de derp."
    10. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'd rather not have to "take" either one.

    11. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'd take Katz, if for no other reason than I haven't managed to figureout how "Piquepaille" is pronounced yet. GAY NAME.

    12. Re:Alright by GeckoX · · Score: 1

      Yeah, and "Coward" is the height of sofistication.

      --
      No Comment.
    13. Re:Alright by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      silly bitch

  3. The future is now. by Sheetrock · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Not only for plasmonics, but for mutable instruction sets. There has been a tendency in computing innovation to withdraw to yesterday's discoveries. Tried-and-true approaches offer the twin comforts of backwards compatibility and tested reliability, attractive propositions to the modern CEO or venture capitalist savvy enough to recognize the additional benefit of recognizing further gains on already completed research. Unfortunately, and in my opinion, this follow-the-leader approach has lead to stagnation in CPU development. I'll explain using a simplified analogy for the benefit of the less technically-inclined.

    Let us think of a computer processing unit as a juggler, and bytes as mangoes. Older CPUs would juggle one mango at a time, and frequently require modifications to the stage to boot. Around the 1980s, they could juggle two mangoes. Then four around 1990, and today as many as eight at a time! Now you would be expected to be quite impressed with each leap, notwithstanding the fact that you really wanted a juggler that could handle melons, grapefruit, or watermelon slices instead of (or in addition to) mangoes. In addition, the fact that you are juggling in a zoo where a primate is free to grab your fruit and substitute twigs (or worse!) mid-juggle owing to something called "stack smashing" in computer terminology is not supposed to discourage you.

    There is a movement towards something called mutable paragraphs, where as in English "words" (groups of bytes) can be of different lengths depending on need. This may mean the ability to exactly fill out a data page for better efficiency, or to allow the CPU to work with communication protocols in their element (if a common network packet is 68 bytes long, a word should be ½NP or 34 bytes in the I/O buffer.) It also means that you use no more CPU space than you absolutely need to for a computational step, decreasing wear and tear on your components.

    I guess what I'm getting at is that science fiction has nothing on practical interative design for real world technological improvement. Sure, we might get to the same place we read about 50 years ago, but not all in one step.

    --

    Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
    -- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.




    1. Re:The future is now. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      +5 You Made All That Shit Up Didn't You?

    2. Re:The future is now. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, a while back. But hey, why not recycle if it will get you +5 right?

    3. Re:The future is now. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      No, he's a cut-n-paste troll. I feel kind of bad about blowing the whistle on him, as he's a beautiful example of what all trolls should aspire to, but, honestly, aren't people going to realize that this talk of stack smashing and juggling mangos sounds familiar?

    4. Re:The future is now. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      Copied from his earlier post here

    5. Re:The future is now. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OMG he's a cut-n-paste troll?! Does the original author realize that his work is gone?

    6. Re:The future is now. by Bodhammer · · Score: 1

      Let us think of a computer processing unit as a juggler, and bytes as mangoes. Older CPUs would juggle one mango at a time, and frequently require modifications to the stage to boot. Around the 1980s, they could juggle two mangoes. Then four around 1990, and today as many as eight at a time! Now you would be expected to be quite impressed with each leap, notwithstanding the fact that you really wanted a juggler that could handle melons, grapefruit, or watermelon slices instead of (or in addition to) mangoes. In addition, the fact that you are juggling in a zoo where a primate is free to grab your fruit and substitute twigs (or worse!)
      I prefer to use this instead, it has the "Automatic Pulp Ejection" module. The loud noise also keeps the primates away...

      --
      "I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
    7. Re:The future is now. by Repton · · Score: 1
      ... practical interative design ...

      Did you mean "interactive" or "iterative"? It's just one letter difference either way!

      --
      Repton.
      They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
    8. Re:The future is now. by bperkins · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Try googling "Let us think of a computer processing unit as a juggler, and bytes as mangoes."

  4. I can see it working by Neil+Blender · · Score: 5, Funny

    But they might need to rephase the modulators and run in through some sort of tachion inverter feild.

    1. Re:I can see it working by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No problem. They should be able to reconfigure the deflector array to emit a modulating anti-graviton beam. That should create a tachyon inverter field big enough to stablize the plasmonic infrastructure.

    2. Re:I can see it working by Tumbleweed · · Score: 1

      That's good, but if we route a phased graviton pulse through the GNDN tubes, and output through the main deflector dish, we can probably get an order of magnitude increase. We'll need to divert warp power to the shields to protect against reflected Bertol Rays, though.

      Either that, or we change the gravitational constant of the universe. Take your pick.

    3. Re:I can see it working by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

      how about we just rephase these posts to where the joke was funny the first time and not the third time? oh wait.. already done.

    4. Re:I can see it working by Tumbleweed · · Score: 2, Funny

      Good thought, but we should be careful to avoid a feedback loop which could overload the inertial dampeners, and possibly cause the subspace bubble to either lose cohesion, or perhaps even become detached from the regular space-time continuum. Don't laugh - I've had it happen, and you wouldn't _believe_ the amount of trouble it is to get the Traveller to help you out. What a primadonna, and his consultation fees are outrageous!

    5. Re:I can see it working by dicepackage · · Score: 1

      That is where the flux capacitor comes in handy.

    6. Re:I can see it working by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Make it so.

    7. Re:I can see it working by CProgrammer98 · · Score: 1

      don't forget to modukate the shield harmonics- that's always the solution!

      --
      And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour Isaiah 3:5
  5. Heat by TheKidWho · · Score: 3, Insightful

    How much heat are these things going to generate though. Because you know E = hf, if you have 100,000 times the frequency, your going to need to throw in 100,000 times the energy!! Of course that is simplification of what is really happening with these kinds of chips and it is much more complicated then just 100,000 times the energy needed. But it seems like these things might make the Pentium IV seems like a fridge!

    1. Re:Heat by markana · · Score: 3, Insightful

      This is why the plasma conduits in the Federation control panels keep blowing up in their faces...

    2. Re:Heat by tanmay80 · · Score: 1

      6.63*10^-34 * 10^5... :) not much i would guess :)

    3. Re:Heat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      the fact that an electron has mass, and a photon is practically massless, would mean that moving an electron at a lower frequency would likely still require a higher energy expenditure.

    4. Re:Heat by ralphclark · · Score: 2, Funny

      Piffle! Just use a smaller value of Planck's constant! Easy. :o)

    5. Re:Heat by barawn · · Score: 4, Informative

      How much heat are these things going to generate though. Because you know E = hf, if you have 100,000 times the frequency, your going to need to throw in 100,000 times the energy!! Of course that is simplification of what is really happening with these kinds of chips and it is much more complicated then just 100,000 times the energy needed. But it seems like these things might make the Pentium IV seems like a fridge!

      Power does usually scale with the frequency, but it also scales with the signal strength (number of carriers: intensity in a photonic case, ~voltage in an electronic case). If you can up the frequency by a factor of two and cut the voltage (for instance) by a factor of two, it's the same power usage.

      Of course, using E = hf is completely wrong here - that's the energy of a photon, and in a completely photonic chip, wouldn't matter in the tiniest bit - because the photons are emitted at one point, and absorbed at another, so there's no net energy loss.

      Most of the places where the frequency dependence comes in are energy losses - like the resistance of a wire. With light, there's very little energy loss (in a fiber, for instance), so the chip will run very, very cool.

    6. Re:Heat by Biff+Stu · · Score: 1

      This is not an issue because we are far from the quantum limit here. You are correct that the plasmons are quantized. The RF energy that travels through the interconnects on conventional chips is also quantized. Nobody talks about this because it is a non-issue. Even even when you scale things up by 10^4, it's a non issue. You can just use 10^4 times fewer quanta to deliver your signals and the power can stay the same.

    7. Re:Heat by rapidweather · · Score: 1
      ...100,000 times the energy needed...

      Here's a link to a Forbidden Planet site, where they have a series of photos, one or two showing the vast power source beneath the surface of Altair IV, the "Forbidden Planet".

      A setup like that is where the "100,000 times the energy" might come from. The actor who explained the power setup was Walter Pidgeon.

      At that link they have movie posters and storyline on Forbidden Planet. I saw the movie when it was current in 1956, and we really believed in that vast power source after Dr. Moribus explained it to the movie audience! If you have not seen this movie, go rent it, it's great.

      So, with a little luck, the new extremely fast processor will be a reality before long...BTW, here's a link to a new Hitachi 1000 GB hard drive that is now being tested, using a new twist on storage technology. Can't wait. (Isn't science fiction/fact wonderful?)

    8. Re:Heat by RevRigel · · Score: 1

      Power usage is generally linear with frequency, but proportional to the square of the voltage. Your example would use roughly half the power.

    9. Re:Heat by owlstead · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Fortune cookie for you, Mr Dallas

      The primary purpose of the DATA statement is to give names to constants;
      instead of referring to pi as 3.141592653589793 at every appearance, the
      variable PI can be given that value with a DATA statement and used instead
      of the longer form of the constant. This also simplifies modifying the
      program, should the value of pi change.
      -- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers

    10. Re:Heat by Any+Web+Loco · · Score: 1

      No... the reason why "the plasma conduits in the Federation control panels keep blowing up in their faces..." is 'cos it looks cool on TV.

  6. Plasmonics for Invisibility by MLopat · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Another use for this technology maybe rendering objects invisible to the observer. Using plasmons to stop light from scattering back to the observer's eyes. Unfortunately it can only be used to hide very small objects since the wave lengths of the light need to be near the size of the object that reflecting them.

    If anyone wants anymore info on this check out this link.

    1. Re:Plasmonics for Invisibility by MLopat · · Score: 1

      My apologies, the correct link is here

    2. Re:Plasmonics for Invisibility by halftrack · · Score: 1

      If you want to stop light from scattering back to the observer's eyes you could use a new, hot technology. We call it _black_paint_ where I come frome.

      --
      Look a monkey!
    3. Re:Plasmonics for Invisibility by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's kinda funny. But you do realize that just because you paint something black, you can still see the fucking thing?!

    4. Re:Plasmonics for Invisibility by EvilSporkMan · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yes, and stopping the light from reaching the observer's eyes would also cause the region to appear black. You actually need complete transparency and cleanliness for invisibility (i.e. passing light instead of stopping it).

      --
      -insert a witty something-
    5. Re:Plasmonics for Invisibility by davedx · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't that make the object look silhouetted, not invisible?

      It would work for stealth aircraft though, because there's no "background"...

      --
      "This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time."
  7. Plasmonics does not sound like... by stefanlasiewski · · Score: 4, Funny

    Plasmonics does not sound like a perfectly cromulent word. Are you sure that the authors haven't embiggened the word a bit a bit? I mean, it's not unpossible...

    --
    "Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
  8. The Answer will be... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    plasmonic repeaters.

  9. Sounds like.... by Valiss · · Score: 5, Funny

    Today, plasmons can only travel a few millimeters before dying, while today's chips are typically about a centimeter across.

    Well, in that case, it sounds similar to my research. See, if you jump, you can fly. Now currently, I can only fly a foot or two. Of course, most people want to fly longer distances, but it's a start.

    --

    -Valiss
    1. Re:Sounds like.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I can fly WAY farther than that, once.

    2. Re:Sounds like.... by fm6 · · Score: 1

      Aha! Another Yogic Flyer!

    3. Re:Sounds like.... by RichardX · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Sounds a bit like my research into anti-gravity by using parachute jumps.

      Y'see, I started with a full size parachute, and each time I make a jump I use a slightly smaller chute than last time. Eventually I won't need a parachute at all!

      --
      Curiosity was framed. Ignorance killed the cat.
    4. Re:Sounds like.... by jayhawk88 · · Score: 1

      The trick to flying is to jump and miss the ground. Perhaps this will improve your results.

    5. Re:Sounds like.... by Hynee · · Score: 1
      Today, plasmons can only travel a few millimeters before dying, while today's chips are typically about a centimeter across.

      Well, in that case, it sounds similar to my research. See, if you jump, you can fly. Now currently, I can only fly a foot or two. Of course, most people want to fly longer distances, but it's a start.

      OK, I know you're joking, but it brings up an important point, flight is "flight over arbitrary distances", so the recent around the world on one tank was important, but it wasn't flight when the old type failed, the old type was just limited by external factors, like the energy density of fuels.

      You may be only able to fling plasmons millimetres, but flinging them centimetres may be good enough, you may not need to keep them alive for arbitrary lengths of time. Look at RAM, you only need to keep the charge in the capicitors for nanoseconds, because you can get a reading out of those capacitors fast, and you can just refresh them.
      --
      Damn, I already moderated this topic. Now I'll have to log in with my sock puppet to comment.
    6. Re:Sounds like.... by fronthead · · Score: 1

      What if we were to shrink the size of the chips using nanomaterials methods? Would that make plasmonics more useful or would it defeat the purpose by improving the effectiveness of electronics to a level where a plasmonic improvement would be negligible? Is it even relevant to ask at this point? All this nanoscale stuff makes me salivate, but so far all we have are fixin's (quantum dots, nanowires, carbon nanotubes and the like) and no sandwich.

    7. Re:Sounds like.... by CProgrammer98 · · Score: 1

      Ahhhhh I see your problem... you're trying to fly by jumpin UP. This will never work....

      You need to start by throwing yourself at the ground from a high point, so gravity is giving you a big helping hand... and then the most important step... practise MISSING the ground... Therein lies the secret.

      --
      And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour Isaiah 3:5
  10. Piquepaille... by stud9920 · · Score: 0

    ...more like Pisspie am I rite

  11. Re:Roland Piquepaille and Slashdot: Is there a con by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
  12. Re:Plasmonics does not sound like... by tomcode · · Score: 2, Funny

    Didn't the Plasmonics tour with the Dead Kennedys in the 1980s?

    --
    f u cn rd ths u cn gt a gd jb n cmptr prgmng
  13. Maybe use nano-wires? by Rightcoast · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I know next to nothing about this field but wonder if it would be possible to bridge the gap in distance using using metal or ceramic nano-wires embedded on-chip for the plasmons to travel across?

    1. Re:Maybe use nano-wires? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      I know next to nothing about this field but wonder if it would be possible to bridge the gap in distance using using metal or ceramic nano-wires embedded on-chip for the plasmons to travel across?

      I don't know a ton about it either, but the article discussed what kind of material would be optimal for them to travel through, saying that aluminum would be better than copper (which is ironic since the industry has switched to copper from aluminum since copper is better for electrical currents) and suggesting that new alloys with better performance might be created if this technology takes off.

      So, the point is, the plasmons already do travel across metal. In fact, if I understood the article correctly, plasmons exist as part of a phenomenon that happens inside metal, or rather on the surface of the metal. In other words, they already travel on metal, so the idea of adding metal for them to travel on doesn't make a lot of sense.

    2. Re:Maybe use nano-wires? by totoanihilation · · Score: 1

      Or couldn't they build the equivalent of buffers to repeat the signal at defined intervals? Heck even if it slows down the signal propagation by 3 or 4, the increased speed in general would probably be worth it...

    3. Re:Maybe use nano-wires? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      have y'all considered magic? magic works ya know...

  14. Wiki Free by onyxruby · · Score: 1, Interesting
    Is it really too much to ask for a wiki free link for reference? Articles written by the tyranny of the persistant dont tend to have much to do with reality. Really, I'm sure some school, corp, journal or industry site probably has something about this. How about a link to a google search, or something with some shred of credibility?

    Wikipedia, because the tyranny of the persistant must be right.

    1. Re:Wiki Free by kebes · · Score: 4, Insightful

      As someone who posts using links to wikipedia occasionally, I must say that I object. When I'm looking for a source to explain what I'm talking about, I simply reference the best URL I can find. Very often, that is wikipedia. It doesn't really matter who hosts the data if I know it to be valid.

      As someone who has done some research on surface plasmons, I find the wikipedia article on Plasmon to be accurate and useful, so I think it is a good reference. Not all wikipedia articles are so good, but then again I don't reference the bad ones.

      On the other hand, you are pointing out that we shouldn't accept wikipedia articles just because wikipedia is cool and lots of people edited the article so it must be right. Yes, that's valid. However, as with *all* sources of information, whether it is a wiki or slashdot or an encyclopedia or the local news, the end-consumer MUST use his judgement to decide if the information is valid or BS. It is an illusion to think that traditional sources of information are error free. In all cases, the reader must simply use judgement and double-check if things seem wrong.

    2. Re:Wiki Free by LiquidCoooled · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't think he is complaining about wikipedia in itself.
      More the fact that a person with an agenda could replace clean methodical bias free information with drivel changing the view for everyone in the process.
      The original source may not have the time or inclination to maintain his articles, so the biased view remains.

      It may be required in the long run to have a karma/points system - much like slashdot, where particular versions of articles can be rated and those written by established experts gain greater weight and visiblity.
      An outside user could view all, uncut and raw, or they can view the cream of the crop so to speak.

      --
      liqbase :: faster than paper
    3. Re:Wiki Free by Ungrounded+Lightning · · Score: 1

      I don't think he is complaining about wikipedia in itself.
      More the fact that a person with an agenda could replace clean methodical bias free information with drivel changing the view for everyone in the process.
      The original source may not have the time or inclination to maintain his articles, so the biased view remains.


      This, by the way, is one of the things the Xanadu hypertext system was intended to prevent.

      A link-end was not just to a particular page, but a particular section of text (as small as a single byte - and if I'd had my way, a particular crack between two bytes {I have my reasons}) in the context of a particular document at a particular moment in its edit history.

      From there, if you wanted to see the "current version", you could jump to the end of the edit history. Or you could browse the (published) edit history. Or you could retrieve other documents that also included/referenced the text (those PARTICULAR bytes, not strings that were identical) in question.

      Gee. I wonder why it didn't get done and the WWW took over. B-)

      --
      Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
    4. Re:Wiki Free by Dutch_Cap · · Score: 1

      "The original source may not have the time or inclination to maintain his articles, so the biased view remains."

      You seem to forget that anyone can look at previous versions of the article and change it back, not just the original author. There is no reason why the biased view would have to remain. In fact, in practice biased articles are often edited to become more balanced over time.

  15. Plasmonics? by tekrat · · Score: 2, Funny

    Wasn't that a Punk Rock Band from the 80's with Wendy O'Williams?

    --
    If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
    1. Re:Plasmonics? by Rightcoast · · Score: 1

      Nope, that was The Plasmatics...and boy was she hot.

  16. Re:Plasmonics does not sound like... by FidelCatsro · · Score: 1

    All cromulance aside the embignation of the issue is not important as its dohlarity is blogular and it becomes cromulant.

    --
    The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
  17. To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you're wondering why all this fuss about the Roland Piquepaille problem, check out the rpiquepa's Recently Accepted Submissions.

    6 articles were submitted in the last month, NONE were rejected. If there were any Rejected articles, they would be displayed under a "Recent Submissions" section.

    What are the chances that the Slashdot editors accept 100% of Roland's submissions, when they reject the majority of submissions from other people.

    When was the last time YOU had a story accepted by the Slashdot crew?

    1. Re:To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by Neil+Blender · · Score: 5, Informative

      6 articles were submitted in the last month, NONE were rejected. If there were any Rejected articles, they would be displayed under a "Recent Submissions" section.

      Not true. You only see your own rejected submissions. Other people can only see your accepted submissions.

    2. Re:To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by Dhalka226 · · Score: 1, Offtopic

      What are the chances that the Slashdot editors accept 100% of Roland's submissions, when they reject the majority of submissions from other people.

      Who cares?

      The real question is whether or not the articles he submits are worth the time of Slashdotters to read and reply to them. I'm not entirely sure what the conspiracy theory is--that he has some arrangement with the editors to accept the stories is one thing I've heard--but I frankly don't care WHO submits a story or WHERE they link it to as long as it is worth reading.

      Now, whether or not they are indeed worth reading is up for debate, but that criticism would at least be on the right track.

    3. Re:To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      I stand corrected. Thank you for the clarification.

    4. Re:To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by goaty_the_flying_sho · · Score: 1, Informative

      Hey, hey! Let's not go to far as to include all slashdot editors! timothy is the only one who gets paid by roland, and is the only one who posts these articles.

    5. Re:To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by jazznjava · · Score: 2, Funny

      Maybe Timothy is Roland Piquepaille!

    6. Re:To see the Roland Piquepaille problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OK, now that made me laugh out loud.

  18. Wendy O'Williams... by Sebastopol · · Score: 2, Funny

    ... is making semiconductors???

    Oh, plasMONICS... my bad...

    (I know, I know: she's deceased)

    --
    https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
  19. Let me be the first to call bullshit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    bullshit.

  20. It was the Plasmatics by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And WOW was a piece of work, for sure.

  21. Ob. MST3k reference by loqi · · Score: 3, Funny

    "He worked at Plasmonics Institute, just an engineer in a sealed white suit... he did a good job in the computer race, but his bosses didn't like him so they shot him into space!"

    --
    If other reasons we do lack, we swear no one will die when we attack
  22. What the...? by barawn · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Claiming "100,000 times the frequency" is a little misleading. You're not talking about the processor running at terahertz speeds - simply put, you can't make things small enough to do that. Plasmonic signals, photonic signals, electronic signals - they all travel on the order of light speed. There really wouldn't be much point raising the clock frequency beyond the characteristic length of the processing unit (Pentium 4 designers understand this now - they had to put "drive" stages into the pipeline just to allow signals to propagate, and that deep pipeline lead to a very low IPC).

    This would be useful for things like memory and processor interconnects, because you could shove gigantic amounts of data. Hence the reason that the article stresses their use as high-traffic freeways. I'm not sure I see the point in an all-plasmonic chip (unless they've got power advantages) because of size concerns.

    1. Re:What the...? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Electrons do not travel at even close to the speed of light. Current (electron drift) travels 1 inch in about approx 1 nano second, potential does travel at the speed of light, but diodes need electrons!

    2. Re:What the...? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      You're not talking about the processor running at terahertz speeds - simply put, you can't make things small enough to do that.
      ...
      This would be useful for things like memory and processor interconnects, because you could shove gigantic amounts of data. Hence the reason that the article stresses their use as high-traffic freeways. I'm not sure I see the point in an all-plasmonic chip (unless they've got power advantages) because of size concerns.

      Well, I'm sure they are not a miracle cure, but if they allow a lot more bandwidth in a given amount of space, you might able to use one plasmonic line to replace several electrical ones, thus reducing wasted space and therefore bringing things closer together. For example, if you have some value computed on one part of the chip and it's an 8-bit value, maybe you could mulitiplex this onto a single plasmonic line, shuttle it across the chip, and then demultiplex it at the other end. If the distance to be travelled is large, then the savings of the 7 lines eliminated might more than make up for the wastage of the multiplexing and demultiplexing circuits at either end.

      Of course, that's only useful to the extent that you have signals that travel long distances on the chip, and of course a lot of the processor is devoted to computing things, not just transmitting them back and forth. Still, imagine if you could carry the contents of an entire cache line from L2 cache to L1 cache in just one or two or three plasmonic lines, and the entire cache line could arrive in one cycle. That seems somehow useful.

      I guess what it boils down to is that plasmonics signal transmission could probably do really radical wave pipelining, so any time wave pipelining could be useful, plasmonics might come in handy.

    3. Re:What the...? by barawn · · Score: 1

      Did I say electrons?

      Read it again. I said electronic signals, not electrons. I chose my words carefully. Read more carefully next time.

    4. Re:What the...? by barawn · · Score: 1

      Of course, that's only useful to the extent that you have signals that travel long distances on the chip, and of course a lot of the processor is devoted to computing things, not just transmitting them back and forth. Still, imagine if you could carry the contents of an entire cache line from L2 cache to L1 cache in just one or two or three plasmonic lines, and the entire cache line could arrive in one cycle. That seems somehow useful.

      I agree - that's mainly what I was thinking.

      The important thing to realize is that while the plasmonic line might be "running" at 100 THz (optical), the processor would not: because if it was, it'd just be waiting a huge amount of time for the data to arrive. A huge amount of time - if you assume that, say, the L1 cache is just 1 mm away, it'd be waiting over 2000 clock cycles, even if it's a plasmonic processor. It's more believable that the processor would be running at GHz speeds, and that plasmonic line would simply act to reduce 32 wires to 1. Speed of light still puts a strong upper bound on the ultimate switching speed of processors.

      At that point you'd have to start changing processor designs, though, because instead of being bandwidth-starved, you'd be bandwidth-rich. Definitely a new problem.

  23. It's a desceptive practice by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Why would we hide his posts?

    Because, the articles come from Roland as if he was just another Slashdot user, which then gives more credibility to the submission [1].

    In reality, it's quite clear that there is some sort of business connection between Roland and Slashdot. There is no other reason to accept 100% of Roland's submissions.

    It's a desceptive relationship.

    [1] Except that the credibility is undermined by the constant complaining of the Slashdot readers.

    1. Re:It's a desceptive practice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no other reason to accept 100% of Roland's submissions.

      Where did you get this statistic?

    2. Re:It's a desceptive practice by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 1

      How do we know that they accept 100% of his submissions?

      --

      --
      make install -not war

  24. Re:Plasmonics does not sound like... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think they played backup for the exploited also..
    FC--

  25. Now I know where all the alien nanobugs are hiding by RedLaggedTeut · · Score: 1

    Behind a nanoscopic plasmonic shield oscillating at rotating frequencies.

    And yes, you alien Lords of the Nanobuts, I'll shut up now.

    --
    I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
  26. Transistors move data? by dfn5 · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Today, we're using basically two ways to move data in our computers: transistors carry small amounts of data and are extremely small

    I don't know about your computer, but my computer uses wires to move data and transistors to process said data. I don't see how one can compare transistors to fiber optic cables.

    --
    -- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
  27. Extreme Plasmonics by Cumstien · · Score: 1

    And if Intel makes a dual core plasmonics processor it will be called the Extreme Plasmonics SUX-2000. Or something like that.

    1. Re:Extreme Plasmonics by amliebsch · · Score: 1
      the Extreme Plasmonics SUX-2000.

      Wow! I'd buy that for a dollar!

      --
      If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
  28. Yet another SciFi point of view... by pyrotas · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Plasmons can be easily created in metallic nanotubes. Furthermore, it is possible to create them into an entangled state. This _in principle_ might be exploited on the quantum computation scale.

    1. Re:Yet another SciFi point of view... by Urusai · · Score: 1, Funny

      So you suggest quantum-entangling plasmonic conduits? If we fold them into 11-space we can also exploit zero-point dark energy in the Einstein-Svengali manifold continuum, giving us a positronic gage vector consistent with the Hawking-Niebelungen juxtaposition. What were we talking about?

    2. Re:Yet another SciFi point of view... by pyrotas · · Score: 1
    3. Re:Yet another SciFi point of view... by RocketRainbow · · Score: 1

      I am not an expert in theoretical uses of bizarro quasiparticles with cool names, but I've enjoyed watching CleverNickName play one on TV.

      Now what we have here is a data transportation technology that allows us to move a lot of information around on the motherboard. It might speed up computation time by giving the CPU faster cache access.
      In a quantum computing scenario, what is it exactly that you suggest would occur? Do quantum computers need to access outside information much? Would they need to access entangled information and thus require transport that will maintain the entanglement?
      Just that you don't seem to have said much, and the link you posted is definitely gobbeldygook worthy of Mister Crusher.

      --
      *#*#*#*#*#******* I love peanut butter sandwiches!
  29. Re:Roland Piquepaille and Slashdot: Is there a con by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    Before we talk about money, let's talk about the service that Roland Piquepaille provides in his journal. He goes out and looks for interesting articles about new and emerging technologies. He provides a very brief overview of the articles, then copies a few choice paragraphs and the occasional picture from each article and puts them up on his web page. Finally, he adds a minimal amount of original content between the copied-and-pasted text in an effort to make the journal entry coherent and appear to add value to the original articles. Nothing more, nothing less.

    Sounds just like Slashdot but without the dupes!

  30. is it just me, or... by technoCon · · Score: 1

    does anyone else think the term 'plasmonics' sounds like something you'd see in the movie 'Barbarella?'

    1. Re:is it just me, or... by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 1

      Yup. When I read the summary I as convinced it was an April Fool someone had taken seriously.

      Actually I'm still not convinced it's not...

  31. Do you think by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    these chips would be in production in time for Duke Nukem Forever?

  32. Given time, more feasible? by StimpyPimp · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "Today, plasmons can only travel a few millimeters before dying, while today's chips are typically about a centimeter across."

    Maybe its just me, but as electronics become smaller and smaller, wouldn't this be more and more possible?

    --
    This signature is part of a balanced post.
  33. Just in time (manditory joke) by joey_knisch · · Score: 3, Funny

    Hmm... Let's see...

    7 years: Develop efficient plasmonic tech.
    5 years: Create manufacturing process
    +3 years: Design cpu
    ________________________________

    15 years: Just in time for Duke Nukem Forever

    1. Re:Just in time (manditory joke) by joey_knisch · · Score: 1

      man-di-to-ry
      adj.
      1. Required or commanded by authority; obligatory:
      8 howers of sleap arr manditory foure funktioning

      2. Of, having the nature of, or containing a mandate.

      3...


      Sorry guys and gals. Forgot the golden rule... 1) Sleep. 2) Spellcheck. 3) Post.

    2. Re:Just in time (manditory joke) by War+Geese · · Score: 1

      Duke's next engine change?

  34. That's not the issue by bonch · · Score: 0, Troll

    The issue isn't the worth of the articles posted. They are usually good articles. The issue is that a disproportionate number of Roland's submissions get posted compared to other users, and those submissions usually contain links to his blog which links to the original article, instead of just linking to the original article. Roland makes money off of his blog for adviews, so the controversy is that Slashdot accepts most of his submissions and drives traffic to his blog.

    I understand that some readers don't care about this "controversy." Some of us just don't like the rampant commercialism that's crept into Slashdot, and there's no other way to speak out on it (CmdrTaco dismisses it).

    1. Re:That's not the issue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wouldn't blocking the ads from even appearing kill that revanue? If the connection is never made (think Adblock for mozilla/firefox) there is no way for him to recieve credit for an ad view.

  35. Well, duh by xeon4life · · Score: 1

    You don't need a thesis, dissertation, white paper, or science magazine to tell you that the closer you put things together the faster their particles can travel.

    --
    Real programmers can write assembly code in any language. -- Larry Wall
    1. Re:Well, duh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      shorter amount of time yes... Not faster - faster implies the velocity increases.

      Speed being a distance/time is normalized.

  36. I cannot English by trouser · · Score: 1

    fiber optic cables can carry huge amounts of data, but are much bigger in size, but smaller in Cleveland.

    Boom boom.

    --
    Now wash your hands.
  37. Plasmonics is already outdated by WillAffleckUW · · Score: 1

    Everyone has moved on to Wikimonics.

    Check it out on the Gigabit Internet.

    --
    -- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
  38. Heh, this is a bad idea. by rice_burners_suck · · Score: 1

    Nah. Forget plasmonics, fiber optics, quantum computing, and all this other junk... Let's make computers that are 100% mechanical, but built out of MEMS. Tiny gears, levers, pistons, pendulums, and other mechanisms will perform computations not previously possible with electronic computers. Better yet, let's return to the days of relay logic, but using nanotechnology to built microscopic relays. Good idea.

    1. Re:Heh, this is a bad idea. by LiquidCoooled · · Score: 1

      But if your MEMs were tiny mirrors and prisms, you could perform DSP on light signals and get an extra boost.

      As fast as our computers will be, having light carried around in tubes is going to be the fastest way to comminucate with the external components.

      --
      liqbase :: faster than paper
  39. Well.. by anethema · · Score: 4, Informative

    I havent read the article (this is slashdot after all) but the summary is terrible. (unless its the articles fault)

    From the summary:

    transistors carry small amounts of data and are extremely small, while fiber optic cables can carry huge amounts of data, but are much bigger in size.


    Transistors are just switches in the digital world. Just like anything that would be modulating the optical carrier.

    Fiber optic cables arent switches at all, or even active. You cant even compare them with transistors at all. Compare transistors maybe with an optical switch (which are ususally transistor actuated) or compare fiber optic cable with wires, but not transistors with FO cables.

    --


    It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
  40. RE: the formula E=hf by Teancum · · Score: 1

    While I will agree there are other factors that affect a CPU, this formula does provide a bottom reference value to demonstrate that increased CPU frequency... regarless of effeciency... will always consume more energy.

    There are other fundimental constants in information theory that demonstrate a quantum effect for a single bit of data being manipulated... regardless of the effeciency of the device that is being used. There are fundimental information theory limits to how little energy can be consumed to flip that bit, and the formula of E=hf is a good place to start and try to figure out just how much energy must be used to change a one to a zero and back. The emmission and absorbtion of photons will increase entropy, and will eventually lead to a loss via emmision into the IR band. This generates heat.

    While an optic fibre is quite efficient, it will still have problems in massed quantities found in a CPU. And if the CPU clock frequency is increased to the degree claimed (100,000 times), I think the statement of the grandparent post, "A Pentium would be like a refrigerator to this CPU" is a very true statement. An optical system isn't that much better than copper or gold wires.

  41. For most of todays semiconductor chips... by PaulBu · · Score: 1

    You ahve to charge a line with capacitance C above a certain threshold voltage V to open the transistor gate F times a second, giving you dissipated power of F*CV^2/2 just for that one line -- note V _squared_.

    Of course if you switch to superconductor logic you would not have to chagre the whole line (and there is no voltage except the instance Josephson jucntion switches), but this is a topic for another discussion.

    Other than that, yes, you are correct that you will need roughly 100,000 times more energy to run 100,000 times faster, but your energy is limited by the fact that you want to be safely above kB*T noise to switch in a non-random fashion (lowering T helps a lot ;-) ).

    Paul B.

    1. Re:For most of todays semiconductor chips... by barawn · · Score: 1

      You ahve to charge a line with capacitance C above a certain threshold voltage V to open the transistor gate F times a second, giving you dissipated power of F*CV^2/2 just for that one line -- note V _squared_.

      I said scale, not scale linearly. I didn't want to confuse the issue. :)

    2. Re:For most of todays semiconductor chips... by barawn · · Score: 1

      Whoops, I'm an idiot. I carefully said "scale" originally (because I didn't want to confuse things), and then gave an example that said it scaled linearly. Oops.

  42. The State of Roland's Mind . . . by StateOfTheUnion · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Today, we're using basically (Basically is my cop-out word so that anyone that actually knows this technology can't call me out for any errors) two ways to move data in our computers: transistors carry small amounts of data and are extremely small, while fiber optic cables can carry huge amounts of data, but are much bigger in size(Actually I used the word basically because I used a terrible analogy. Transistors are used for gates and switches. Optical fiber carries information. Perhaps I should have said electrical conductors versus optical fibers, but that wouldn't sound as impressive even though its a much better analogy. But I think that most /. readers are really stupid and won't see through my gobbldey-gook. I am actually French, so you can blame it on the fact that English is not my first language.). Now, imagine a single technology combining the advantages of photonics and electronics. This Stanford University report says a new technology can do it: plasmonics.(This technology is not really new. In fact its not a technology at all. Its actually a natural phonomena, but /. readers are too stupid to know the difference. Also, its not really new either. Its been known for at least a decade . . . at least thats what this link form 1996 implies) (For more about plasmons, read this Wikipedia article.) Theoretically, it is possible to design plasmonic components with the same materials used today by chipmakers, but with frequencies 100,000 times greater than the ones of current microprocessors. There is still a challenge to solve before getting plasmonic chips. Today, plasmons can only travel a few millimeters before dying, while today's chips are typically about a centimeter across. Actually the articles that are linked to in the topic say that heat, connectors and other issue have to be worked out first, but /. readers can't handle more than one concept at a time, so I'm going to dumb this down for them) Read this overview for more details and references about plasmonics, and to discover why it's one possible future for chips' circuitry. (shameless plug for my blog where I'm soliciting for "premium blogads" in the upper right side of the blog. But /. readers won't notice that I have a conflict of interest and I'm trying to launch a career as a blogger/ tehcnology writer)

    Come on Roland, give us a break . . . you obviously don't understand what your writing about. Your analogies make no sense, your summarize is full of gross holes and you're trying to "sex-up" plasmons by calling a natural phonomena a technology and saying that it's something "new" when it is not. And seems you're doing this to attract hits to your blog so that you can sell ad space.

    I know this post is harsh, but I have to say that it appears that you are attempting to exploit the /. community for your own personal financial gain. We /. readers aren't as gullible or stupid as you seem to think . . .

    1. Re:The State of Roland's Mind . . . by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > you obviously don't understand what your writing about

      LOL, nor do you! Look up the difference between your and you're. It's the height of irony when slashdorks stick their foot in their mouth over English grade-schoolers should know.

    2. Re:The State of Roland's Mind . . . by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      LOLOlololOLOLOlolOLOLolOLOlOLolololOLLLLLLL!!~``1`

      Shut up.

    3. Re:The State of Roland's Mind . . . by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      I know this post is harsh, but I have to say that it appears that you are attempting to exploit the /. community for your own personal financial gain. We /. readers aren't as gullible or stupid as you seem to think . . .

      Ha, speak for yourself. As a proud Slashdot reader, I assure you that I am quite as gullible and stupid as anybody thinks.

      Thank goodness for the little checkbox that says "Post Anonymously."

      *click* There.

      Slashdot: Gullible. Stupid. And if you prefer, Anonymous.

    4. Re:The State of Roland's Mind . . . by Felonious+Ham · · Score: 1

      I know from funny, and that was funny. I approve an increase in the above post's moderation.

  43. other advantage by eobanb · · Score: 1

    wouldn't plasmonics make van eck phreaking not feasible??

    --

    Take off every sig. For great justice.

  44. Roland's blog is just as bad . . . by StateOfTheUnion · · Score: 1
    Roland's blog is also terrible . . . It is the shameless last link in his topic.

    Plasmons are generated when, under the right conditions, light strikes a metal. The electric field of the light jiggles the electrons in the metal to the light's frequency, setting off density waves of electrons. The process is analogous to how the vibrations of the larynx jiggle molecules in the air into density waves experienced as sound.

    This analogy makes no sense because this is not analogous to how the larnyx jiggles air. The larnyx squeezes together and air is pushed through causing the larnyx to vibrate. In the case of the larnyx, the squeezing of the larnyx as air is exhaled causes flaps of tissue to vibrate . . . . How is this analogous to photons striking metal?

    A much better analogy would be how throwing a stone into a pond causes the water to vibrate. Or throwing a stone at a piece of metal causes sonic vibrations.

    Roland really should do his homework before coming up with his half baked analogies. For homework on the larnyx and how it works, he could start here.

  45. Italian Plasmons by AmicoToni · · Score: 1

    In Italy even babies know plasmons!!
    Here is proof!

  46. computations not previously possible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No, that's wrong. Look up Turing's theorem.
    Or, if you prefer, just imagine that you have this MEMS chip... then you build a working 3-d model of it in a computer and let it run... you'd get the same calculations from it. It might be faster, and it could be analog making it a bitch to simulate on a digital electronic CPU (you can use an analog electronic one), but unless you're talking quantum computing there are no calculations that can't be done with current CPU technology.

    In fact, the only thing that a MEM system might be able to do that a regular CPU can't is crash when you shake your laptop :)

  47. Re:CmdrTaco's response to Roland controversy by StateOfTheUnion · · Score: 4, Insightful
    That's quite surprising considering that Roland links to his own blog where he's soliciting ad space. Smells like a terrible conflict of interest to me.

    Additionally, Roland's writing style is terrible and his command of the technology that he writes about is lackluster at best. Consider:

    He compares connectors (optical fiber) to gates (transistors) and implies that they have the same function. He leaves out key points from the article (like the issue of heat is a complete unknown in the world of plamon based chips ). His summaries are blantant rip offs of the articles where he merely combines two ideas into one sentence or vice versa, giving no editorial content of his own . . . it is all editorial content from the article that he links. I can only assume that he is simply unqualified to give free thought and personal editorial content to the material that he submits.

    He is not a journalist . . . he is a poor writer that steals editorial ideas and implies that they might be his own. He peppers these ideas with his own analogies that make little to no sense.

    I honestly think that he's trying to launch a career as a blogger/technology writer, but I honestly think that he should consider broadening his knowledge of technology and taking some writing courses first.

  48. Slashdot effect? by pbaer · · Score: 1

    But wouldn't the slashdot effect cause him to lose money due to the excessive bandwidth?

    --
    There are 11 types of people, those who know unary and those who don't.
    1. Re:Slashdot effect? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not if what he gets paid for in terms of advertising is greater than the cost of his bandwidth...

      Consider that most of the internet is driven by ad content anymore.

  49. The ironic thing about that cookie is... by leonbrooks · · Score: 2, Interesting
    ...that many early ForTran compilers didn't check too closely to see if what they were assigning to was an LValue, and since a float was six bytes and a pointer to a float was 2 bytes, a compiler would typically store a copy of a constant somewhere and refer to is using the pointer, just as if it was a variable. The end result is that if you did a typoe and executed something that said:
    PI = R * R
    2 = PI
    then from that point onwards, both 2 and PI would assume the value of R squared, so if R started out being 42, then either of
    TYPE *,2
    TYPE *,PI
    would print 1764, not 2.

    If you executed 2 = 2.5 then the statement "two plus two does not equal five, even for large values of 2" would be proven false in any following code.
    --
    Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
  50. /ME is looking forward to... by leonbrooks · · Score: 1

    ...overclocking his fingernail computer by swapping the green CMD (Cuticle Mount Device) LED in it for a blue one. Geeks could have nail-size competitions and "hand clusters". The mind boggles.

    With a name like that, plasmonics doesn't have to have any point as long as it also looks cool. (-:

    --
    Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
  51. Re: the formula E=hf by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    An optical system isn't that much better than copper or gold wires

    Not true! Optics can scale to much higher frequencies than electronics due to the fact that electrons have mass and photons don't. As a result, the electrical system has a much higher impedance in relation to the clock pulse. You are right about E=hf and entropy; however an optical system will in theory take much less energy.

  52. Excellent! Babbage Engines by the carat... by leonbrooks · · Score: 1

    ...or gram, supercomputing clusters measured in kilolitres. Do your upgrades with a plastic jug and a funnel. I can't wait! (-:

    --
    Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
  53. Actually, some of them are. by Ungrounded+Lightning · · Score: 2, Informative

    Fiber optic cables arent switches at all, or even active.

    Actually, some of them are.

    One really useful example is doping the fiber with small amounts of an atom that lases in the frequency band of the light being carried. Then you wrap a bit of the fiber around a lamp giving off a suitable higer pump frequency of light. Result: A repeater amplifier. Feed it a little power and it boosts your signal.

    There are several other hacks. (At least one of them is a logic gate.)

    --
    Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
    1. Re:Actually, some of them are. by anethema · · Score: 1

      Thats really sweet, i didnt know. You diserve some moderation for sure.

      --


      It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
  54. Re: the formula E=hf by barawn · · Score: 1

    There are fundimental information theory limits to how little energy can be consumed to flip that bit, and the formula of E=hf is a good place to start and try to figure out just how much energy must be used to change a one to a zero and back. The emmission and absorbtion of photons will increase entropy, and will eventually lead to a loss via emmision into the IR band. This generates heat.

    Well, yes, but that energy is miniscule, even at optical frequencies. Even if you assume that it was changing a megabit of information every clock cycle for an entire second, that's still only 7 watts. And that's a processor that's well over a billion times more powerful than a modern processor. That's a perfectly efficient processor, yes, but you get the point.

    And if the CPU clock frequency is increased to the degree claimed (100,000 times)

    As I posted elsewhere, if the CPU clock frequency is that high, we're building computers out of individual atoms, which is, I believe, a harder task than dealing with dissipating 7 watts.

    The physical constant which hurts you the most at these frequencies isn't Planck's constant. It's the speed of light.

  55. Getting back to the subject... by VernonNemitz · · Score: 2, Informative

    A few years back there was some fuss about asynchronous chips. Looks to me like this is the solution to the distance problem.

  56. a few mm is not a problem by Doppler00 · · Score: 1

    I'm curious what part of a CPU they were saying was a couple cm accross. The die itself, where all the transistors are is probably less than a square CM in most cases. Given the fact that half or more of that is cache memory and the fact that most computation takes place within an area probably less than a few mm in length, it seems all they would need to do is repeat the signal every stage or so. But maybe this is why it's so difficult.

    1. Re:a few mm is not a problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well that's just it.
      No signal ever goes more than a couple mm on a modern microchip anyway for the same reasons. Speed and signal degradation. Hardly a new concept.

  57. I was wrong by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 1

    I made a false assumption... I thought you could see all of the rejected submissions in a user's profile. I was wrong.

    This post set me straight.

    However, 6 accepted submissions in under 30 days is quite suspicious. Perhaps he made 300 submissions, and the editors only accepted 6...

  58. Choosing your relatives by TrebleMaker · · Score: 1

    Oh, I miss the ground just fine.

    Tell me what to do about this planet that keeps jumping up and smacking me in the butt when I try to fly!

    --
    In Soviet Russia a beowulf cluster of these things imagines you welcoming your new, neural-network overlords.
  59. Re:Your sig by CyberDruid · · Score: 1

    What does filling in missing letters have to do with computer programming?

    --

    Opinions stated are mine and do not reflect those of the Illuminati

  60. Could somebody explain this? by carlmenezes · · Score: 1

    I get the moving lots of data around at massive speeds concept. However, how about some basic logic gate or even a transistor like functionality using plasmons? Wouldn't THAT be what would bring faster chips closer?
    I mean, having a pipe that can transport huge amounts of data at the speed of light is great, but wouldn't the feasibility of a chip depend on the capability of routing all that data based on basic logical conditions?

    Kinda like no use having a missile that can carry a million tons and fly at Mach 100 if you can't control where it goes...

    Or am I missing something here?

    --
    Find a job you like and you will never work a day in your life.
    1. Re:Could somebody explain this? by barawn · · Score: 1

      Or am I missing something here?

      The transistor speed that matters is the switching frequency (that is, how fast it can switch from a 1 to a 0, and vice versa). That's what the "GHz" means, right? OK.

      The point here is that it would be pointless to have a CPU made of transistors that switched at 100 THz (optical) frequencies. It wouldn't be faster at all.

      Why? Because that chip still has to be made of atoms, and atoms have a scale. That scale is on the order of nanometers. Let's just say 1 nanometer, to make things convenient.

      At 100 THz, a signal can only travel about 3 microns in a clock cycle. If you've got a scale of 1 nanometer, that means every processing element has to be less than 3000 elements distance in order to keep things in sync - and there's no way you can build a CPU like that - it's just not enough components.

      Scale is what limits the frequency of chips, not the method of signal propagation, and chips are very, very rapidly reaching the point where it's simply not feasible to scale anymore - not from a physical point of view, but from a signal propagation point of view.

      Anyway, that's not the big bottleneck in processors anyway. Bandwidth is. A modern CPU spends a huge amount of time stalling and waiting on data. If there's anything that can speed up that data transfer, it'll have a much larger impact than CPU speed increases.

  61. Careful! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    .. its plasma...

  62. Thanks for stating what I was thinking by blueberry(4*atan(1)) · · Score: 1

    I think a few more science classes would help Roland to make more sense and sound less like a pseudo-scientific perpetual-motion troll. I think he has a future in advertising, or maybe he could work for Transmeta. :)

  63. Use by Ricken · · Score: 1

    Duct Tape. Put lots of those small things together, add some chewing gum and you've made a bomb.

  64. Nah. by dmaxwell · · Score: 1

    Just paint it pink and activate a cheap and simple Somebody Else's Problem field.

  65. surface plasmon resonance by bodrell · · Score: 1
    Of course, using E = hf is completely wrong here - that's the energy of a photon, and in a completely photonic chip, wouldn't matter in the tiniest bit - because the photons are emitted at one point, and absorbed at another, so there's no net energy loss.
    Since that's the most intelligent remark I've seen for this story, I'm going to jack this thread. Plasmons still seem like magic to me, but I get to use the technology for something useful while electrical engineers figure out how to make plasmon computers. Biacore makes surface plasmon resonance (SPR) instruments that allow you to measure surface binding. It's very cool technology; light hits a glass-covered gold, and a plasmon interacts with stuff (for example, antibodies) on the other side of the gold surface. The angle of total internal reflection changes when there is a binding event, and that angle is a measureable signal. Really nifty. Unfortunately, the instruments aren't cheap.
    --
    Si la vida me da palo, yo la voy a soportar Si la vida me da palo, yo la voy a espabilar
  66. Re:Your sig by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yes, so many repubs turned out that there was little to no wait in every republican-majority precinct, and so few dems turned out that there were several-hour lines in theirs. Sounds right to me, you republican idiot.

  67. Re:Your sig by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 1

    How do you know she wanted to die?

    Regardless, it's not a place for Republican grandstanding, nor is it a place for democrats Jesse Jackson to get his face on the news again.

  68. Re: the formula E=hf by Teancum · · Score: 1

    If we are going to get CPU speeds to Terahertz or Petahertz frequencies, I will have to agree that the physical restraints of the speed of light are going to be a very major factor with CPU designs. Also, I don't know of any physical device manufactuer who is even remotely claiming even a 1% efficiency for storage and manipulation of a bit. (That would be a huge marketing ploy if it ever were achieved.) Physical devices, even optical systems, are far less efficient than that. There is no way that they are > 100,000 times more energy efficient than conductor/semi-conductor systems if simply because it would have been done already if the savings were that substantial.

    I remember a speech by Adm. Grace Hooper where she was holding in her hands what she called microseconds, nanoseconds, and picoseconds. Basically a loop of wire that in the respective lengths of times it would take for an ideal signal to travel down that much wire. A good talk, and she was willing to give away quite a few nanoseconds, much less picoseconds. It really gets the concept of distances in small times to a perspective that your mind can grasp real easily.

    Still, even assuming that we can overcome some of the issues with FTL communication at some point in the future, Planck's constant is going to be lurking in the background ready to bite even if we are using individual quarks for gate switching.

    It is neat to see just what "hard" limits you can put on Moore's Law based on other hard physical constants from "hard science". It is also telling that electronic component manufacturers are having to get creative (such as the optical technologies being discussed in the article under discussion) in order to push systems beyond what appears to be hard limits to current manufacturing technologies.

    Something beyond a photomask on lithographed semi-conductors must be done to get another 1000x increase in CPU speeds. Manufacturers are already using X-rays to get the fine details that are needed for the device manufacturing. If the frequencies get much higher, it will move into the gamma-ray section of the EM band.

  69. Re: the formula E=hf by barawn · · Score: 1

    Also, I don't know of any physical device manufactuer who is even remotely claiming even a 1% efficiency for storage and manipulation of a bit. (That would be a huge marketing ploy if it ever were achieved.) Physical devices, even optical systems, are far less efficient than that. There is no way that they are > 100,000 times more energy efficient than conductor/semi-conductor systems if simply because it would have been done already if the savings were that substantial.

    Optical systems are orders of magnitude (maybe not 5 orders, but at least 2 or 3) more efficient than electronic ones, simply because there's no resistance and because you can multiplex signals optically rather than needing to do it electronically.

    A good talk, and she was willing to give away quite a few nanoseconds, much less picoseconds. It really gets the concept of distances in small times to a perspective that your mind can grasp real easily.

    Speed of light is a foot per nanosecond (literally: google it - it's 0.98 ft/ns), or 10 mils per picosecond. Easy enough. Incredibly useful mnemonic if you need to generate a delayed signal. "Get me 20 feet of cable, I need a clock-cycle delay." (There's a factor of 2-ish in there for the signal speed, but it's not that big a deal, and easy enough to remember).

    Still, even assuming that we can overcome some of the issues with FTL communication at some point in the future, Planck's constant is going to be lurking in the background ready to bite even if we are using individual quarks for gate switching.

    You realize that you are considering the speed of light to be a "soft" issue (as opposed to the "hard" limits from energy concerns). What makes you think that the speed of light is any less "hard" than the other concerns? Or, put another way - if we can get around the speed of light issue, I guarantee we can get around the entropic considerations (for one thing, the two aren't independent constraints).

    Something beyond a photomask on lithographed semi-conductors must be done to get another 1000x increase in CPU speeds. Manufacturers are already using X-rays to get the fine details that are needed for the device manufacturing. If the frequencies get much higher, it will move into the gamma-ray section of the EM band.

    Nah, you use non-optical methods, like electron beam lithography (which is planned). But that's all scale issues. You can't get another thousand-fold increase in CPU speeds. It's not going to happen. Another tenfold increase is not going to happen. CPU speed increases were done and through the instant you saw "drive" stages appear in the chip design to compensate for speed of light delay. They have hit the wall. The main increase in computing power at this point will come via increases in computational ability, not computational frequency.

  70. Re: the formula E=hf by Teancum · · Score: 1
    You realize that you are considering the speed of light to be a "soft" issue (as opposed to the "hard" limits from energy concerns). What makes you think that the speed of light is any less "hard" than the other concerns?


    I think that FTL communication is a virtual impossibility, and some very fundimental physics reasoning must be developed to make it happen.

    I only comment about FTL communication because the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office granted a patent for FTL communication. The examiner must have flunked out of college to have approved the concept, but for the next 10-15 years such a process is patented, even if a physical impossibility. Someone (perhaps with a perpetual motion machine) must think this is possible to accomplish.
  71. Re:Your sig by laird · · Score: 1

    "How do you know she wanted to die? Oh, you took the husband's word for it even though a court said there was a dispute."

    Actually, as documented in the court cases, there were three other witnesses that documented her saying on six occasions things that indicated that she didn't want to have her life artificially sustained with no chance of recovery. Like most young people (she was young 15 years ago when this happened) she didn't have a written Living Will, so the court had to make a judgement based on the evidence.

    The parents had no evidence other than their opinions of what she wanted. They later said that even if she'd had a signed Living Will they still would have fought it, which pretty much proves the point to me that they knew what she wanted, but didn't like it. I can understand why her parents would be in denial of the reality of her death (as a parent, I can think of nothing worse than going through 15 years of torture) but I can't understand why anyone else would support their delusions -- it seems unethical to me to encourage "hope" in desparate people given that she was quite clearly gone.

    Another aspect of this that confuses me is that from what I can tell the Catholic Church disapproves of artificial means of sustaining life (because if it's God's will that you die, you shouldn't try to avoid it), but her parents claim that as a Catholic she would want to live no matter what. Does this make sense to anyone else?

    "At least Republicans showed up for the vote. Your beloved Democrats didn't even appear."

    Actually, 50 Democrats voted for it, too. Pretty embarassing that they'd vote for something so pointless. But as a friend put it, their calculation was that voting for it would thrill the 10% of the population that really wants it, would be ignored by the 90% that would oppose it, and didn't cost anything.

    Of course, according to polls, a huge majaority of the country, and a majority of evangelicals and republicans, opposed the congressional meddling, and Bush's ratings are lower than ever. So worse than pathetic pandering to a republican fringe group, it was completely unsuccessful pathetic pandering that managed to not only not satisfy the fringe, but alienated the mainstream. There's hope for rationality to kick in yet.

  72. Re: the formula E=hf by barawn · · Score: 1

    Someone (perhaps with a perpetual motion machine) must think this is possible to accomplish.

    And if that person has a perpetual motion machine and FTL travel, then he can get around both the speed of light issues and the heat issues!

  73. NOT INSIGHTFUL by tod_miller · · Score: 1

    I honestly think that he's trying to launch a career as a blogger/technology writer

    no no no , the ONLY reason his site exists is to reap advertising, NOTHING else.

    Now, a good site that has a real reason to exist, and has advertsiing, fine.

    but this site ONLY exists to reap advertising, and has no product, and is clearly POOR and shouldn't be on /.

    Which is why people hate it!

    I considered setting up a network of blogs with auto scriting rss header publishing, 1 line commentary and advertising to plop myself into a nice semi=-automatic content gravy train to get a few google bucks my way... then I stuck a fork in my penis as punishment for such a bad thought.

    THen I liked it and set up a self mutilation dwarf scat pr0n site, and became rich. so there is an obvious moral to this tale.

    --
    #hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com