For the first time American physicists have shown that it is possible to transmit information (data) via diamond wire. The landmark experiment reveals the potential of these precious stones to be used once in computers and telecommunications. This is the first small step on a long road that can once end up in diamond transistors.
The researchers of Ohio University, led by physicist Chris Hamel, who made the relevant publication in the journal Nanotechnology "Nature Nanotechnology”, they succeeded in sending along the diamond wire electronic information in the form of “spin”. It was the first time that "spin" transmission was observed in diamond, and it was done in a very efficient way.
It was not an electron flow in the traditional way of electronic technology, but for the use of spintronics, an electronics industry that handles the magnetic spin of the electrons (their quantum property called "proprioform") to transfer data. As in a crowd, viewers create a "wave," as everyone in turn gets up from his seat, so in the case of the diamond wire, electrons sequentially transmit their "spin" from one to the other.
"There is no doubt that if this diamond wire was part of a computer, it would transfer information," said Chris Hamel. The wire was only four microns (millimeters long) long and 200 nanometer (billionths of a meter) wide.
Spintronics scientists want to use "spin" to transfer data much faster to computer circuits, so that the latter have much more processing power. The new experiment showed that diamond transmits "spin" better than most metals tested for this purpose so far.
The diamond is hard, transparent, electrically insulating, impervious to environmental wear, acid resistant and does not hold heat like the semiconductors used. As Chris Hamel said, "for a scientist, diamonds are somewhat boring, but it's interesting to look at how they can be used on a computer."
Regarding the high cost for a possible wider use of them in the future, it probably won't be a problem, as long as synthetic diamonds are used and not authentic ones. Instead, a serious technical hurdle is that the American researchers, in order to carry out the innovative spintronics experiment, had to drop the thermowinea at minus 269 degrees Celsius (very close to absolute zero). Many more steps of progress will be needed before it becomes possible to have a diamond transistor that works at room temperature.
Link: For original scientific work (subscription) at:
http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nnano.2014.39.html
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