IBM Demos Single-Atom DRAM

An anonymous reader writes "A single-atom DRAM was demonstrated by IBM recently with a slow-mo movie of the atomic process of setting and erasing a bit on a single atom. Videos of atomic processes inside chips were not possible until now, leading to IBM's claim that its pulsed-STM (used to make the movie) will lead to a new atomic-scale semiconductor industry, and not just for memory chips, according to this EETimes story: 'The ultimate memory chips of the future will encode bits on individual atoms, a capability recently demonstrated for iron atoms by IBM's Almaden Research Center in San Jose, Calif., which unveiled a new pulsed technique for scanning tunneling microscopes (STMs). Pulsed-STMs yield nanosecond time-resolution, a requirement for designing the atomic-scale memory chips, solar panels and quantum computers of the future, but also for making super efficient organic solar cells by controlling photovoltaic reactions on the atomic level.'"

Comments

A video explaining how it works

[rminsk]

Video explaining the process.

Re:where on the periodic table?

[rubycodez]

funny, but actually IBM started with punched cards for external storage, gears for internal memory, and later patch panels for ROM.

http://www.columbia.edu/acis/history/tabulator.html

Re:So.. Much as it seems like it, this does not qu

[TheRaven64]

Actually, Moore's law applies to the number of components on an integrated circuit (for a fixed cost). The original paper makes no mention of processors, and only talks about transistors as an example of the components you put on an IC. It directly applies to RAM, and any other kind of IC, because it's talking about process technology not about what you do with the ICs.