Archive : 5 May 2015 год

According to researchers from Georgia Tech Research Institute and Honeywell International, the development of quantum computers has been limited by the ability to increase the number of qubits. However, the team says it may have solved the problems by creating a way that allows more electrodes to be placed on a chip – and hence qubit densities.

The researchers say a leading qubit candidate is individual ions trapped inside a vacuum chamber and manipulated with lasers. But the team says because the connections for the electrodes needed to generate the trapping fields come at the edge of the chip, their number is limited by the chip's perimeter.

The team's approach uses new microfabrication techniques that allow more electrodes to fit onto the chip, while preserving the laser access needed.

The team's design borrows ideas from the BGA package, where the density of electrical connection is increased.

"Ions are very sensitive to stray electric fields and other noise sources, and a few microns of the wrong material in the wrong place can ruin a trap. But when we ran the BGA trap through a series of benchmarking tests, we were pleasantly surprised that it performed at least as well as all our previous traps," said team leader Nicholas Guise.

More chip space was also provided by replacing surface or edge capacitors with trench capacitors and by moving wire connections.

The team will now work to shrink the technology and to address the engineering challenges involved into creating a packaged system that would enable quantum computing.

Author
Graham Pitcher

Source:  www.newelectronics.co.uk

European semiconductor sales in March 2015 amounted to $2.954billion, an increase of 2.7% over February sales, according to the European Semiconductor Industry Association (ESIA). 

European semiconductor sales in March 2015 amounted to $2.954billion, an increase of 2.7% over February sales, according to the European Semiconductor Industry Association (ESIA).

The increase, described by ESIA as 'healthy', was driven by growth in demand across several product categories. Leading the sales growth were discretes, sensors and actuators, and MOS MCUs, where revenues grew by 8.7%, 8.5% and 7.9% respectively.

However, on a global basis, semiconductor sales in March 2015 declined by 0.1% to $27.7bn compared to February, but were 6% higher than in March 2014.

On a quarterly basis, Q1 sales were down 4.9% compared to Q4 2014, but 6% more than in Q1 2014.

Looking to avoid exchange rates influencing the figures unduly, ESIA said March 2015 revenues were €2.62bn, 7.8% more than in February and 16.8% more than March 2014. Q1 2015 sales reached €7.87bn, 9.5% higher than the previous quarter.

Author
Graham Pitcher

Source:  www.newelectronics.co.uk

Xilinx has released the Vivado Design Suite 2015.1, said to include major productivity advances. Included in the release are: the Vivado Lab Edition; accelerated Vivado Simulator and third party simulation flows; interactive clock domain crossing analysis; and advanced system performance analysis with the Xilinx Software Development Kit.

The Vivado Lab Edition is a lightweight programming and debug edition of the Vivado Design Suite. It includes the Vivado Device Programmer, Vivado Logic and Serial I/O Analyzer, as well as memory debug tools.

The Vivado Lab Edition is 75% smaller than the complete Vivado Design Edition, reducing set up time and system memory requirements. For design teams that require remote debug or programming over Ethernet, the Vivado Design Suite 2015.1 also provides a standalone hardware server, which is less than 1 percent of the complete Vivado Design Edition.

Vivado Design Suite 2015.1 also features advancements in the simulation flows that speed LogiCORE IP compile times. As a result, overall simulation performance is said to be 20% faster than previous releases. The release also includes simulation flows integrated with those of Aldec, Cadence, Mentor Graphics and Synopsys.

Xilinx has also included interactive clock domain crossing (CDC) analysis capability. This is said to boost productivity by enabling the debug of CDC issues earlier in the design and to speed time to market.

Meanwhile, speeding the development of Zynq-7000 based products, the Xilinx SDK now allows developers to analyse the performance and bandwidth of their SoC design, with a number of key performance metrics available.

Author
Graham Pitcher

Source:  www.newelectronics.co.uk

Laser-generated microplasma in air can be used as a source of broadband terahertz radiation, researchers at the University of Rochester's Institute of Optics have shown.

PhD student Fabrizio Buccheri demonstrated that an approach for generating terahertz waves using intense laser pulses in air can be done with much lower power lasers than previously.

The application of terahertz radiation can be divided into two categories: imaging and spectroscopy. For imaging applications, such as replacing X-rays, a narrow range of terahertz frequencies is needed. This can be generated using specific terahertz devices, such as diodes or lasers. However, for spectroscopy applications, such as security scanning, the terahertz radiation needs to be as 'broadband' as possible, which requires a plasma.

Until now, broadband sources of terahertz radiation have usually used an elongated plasma generated by combining two laser beams of different frequencies. This 'two-colour' approach requires powerful, expensive lasers. The 'one-colour' approach uses one laser frequency to generate the plasma.

An advantage of this 'one-colour' approach is the terahertz waves propagate in a different direction to the laser beam. This makes it easier for potentially coupling the terahertz waves to a wave guide on a microchip, for example.

Through experiments into the polarisation of light Buccheri was able to exploit the physics to use lower laser energies than previously thought possible to generate broadband terahertz waves in air. He replaced elongated plasmas, with lengths ranging from a few millimetres to several centimetres, with a microplasma, about the width of a human hair. He thinks that even lower operation powers could be achieved by fine tuning the type of laser used and changing to a different gas.

Author
Tom Austin-Morgan

Source:  www.newelectronics.co.uk

Sales of International Rectifier products and growing demand for chip card and security products have boosted Infineon's performance in the second quarter of its 2015 financial year.

Sales of International Rectifier products and growing demand for chip card and security products have boosted Infineon's performance in the second quarter of its 2015 financial year.

According to figures released by the company, revenues jumped by 31% to $1.48billion and it expects Q3 revenues to increase by between 7 and 11% over Q2.

"Infineon has recorded a big revenue jump in the second quarter, said CEO Dr Reinhard Ploss, pictured. "Business was running very well, with additional tailwinds provided by the acquisition of International Rectifier

and the strong dollar. The signals we are receiving from our markets are generally positive. We are making good progress with the integration of International Rectifier. Our strategy is paying off and Infineon remains on a growth path."

Product divisions all reported strong performances. Automotive sales grew by 24% compared to the same period last year, while industrial power control product revenues grew by 30% over the same period. Sales of power management and multimarket products were up by 84%, while chip card and security revenues increased by 50%.

Revenues from International Rectifier products were recognised in the automotive, industrial and power management and multimarket sectors, with the 84% boost in the latter's sales due mainly to the acquisition.

Author
Graham Pitcher

Source:  www.newelectronics.co.uk

Researchers at the University of Rochester in the US have shown that defects on an atomically thin semiconductor can produce single photons and say the approach could find application in integrated photonics.

In a paper, the Rochester researchers describe how tungsten diselenide can serve as a platform for solid state quantum dots that do not inhibit the electrical or optical performance of the semiconductor and which can be controlled by applying electric and magnetic fields.

"We start with a black crystal and then peel layers off until we have an extremely thin later left; an atomically thin sheet of tungsten diselenide," said assistant professor of optics Nick Vamivakas.

The researchers took two of these sheets and laid one over the other. At the point where they overlap, a defect is created in the otherwise smooth 2D sheet of semiconductor material. These extremely thin layers are said by the team to be much easier to integrate with other electronics.

Vamivakas said the brightness of the quantum dot emission can be controlled by applying a voltage and noted the next step is to use voltage to 'tune' the colour of the emitted photons.

A key advantage is how much easier it is to create quantum dots in atomically thin tungsten diselenide compared to producing quantum dots in more traditional materials like indium arsenide.

The quantum dots in tungsten diselenide also possess electron spin, said by the team to be a desirable property as it can act as a store of quantum information and provide a probe of the local quantum dot environment.

Author
Graham Pitcher

Source:  www.newelectronics.co.uk