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| The designed semiconductor-free microelectronic device. Image courtesy of UC San Diego Applied Electromagnetics Group. |
I do wonder if this is in anyway applicable in audio…
“The capabilities of existing microelectronic devices, such as transistors, are ultimately limited by the properties of their constituent materials, such as their semiconductors, researchers said. For example, semiconductors can impose limits on a device’s conductivity, or electron flow. Semiconductors have what’s called a band gap, meaning they require a boost of external energy to get electrons to flow through them. And electron velocity is limited, since electrons are constantly colliding with atoms as they flow through the semiconductor.
A team of researchers in the Applied Electromagnetics Group led by electrical engineering professor Dan Sievenpiper at UC San Diego sought to remove these roadblocks to conductivity by replacing semiconductors with free electrons in space. “And we wanted to do this at the microscale,” said Ebrahim Forati, a former postdoctoral researcher in Sievenpiper’s lab and first author of the study.”