Modern Microprocessor Built From Complementary Carbon Nanotube Transistors Gage Hills Christian Lau Andrew Wright Mindy D Bishop Tathagata Srimani Pritpal Kanhaiya Rebecca Ho Aya Amer Yosi Stein Denis Murphy Arvind Anantha Chandrakasan Max M Shulaker by Gage Hills & Christian Lau & Andrew Wright & Mindy D. Bishop & Tathagata Srimani & Pritpal Kanhaiya & Rebecca Ho & Aya Amer & Yosi Stein & Denis Murphy & Arvind & Anantha Chandrakasan & Max M. Shulaker instant download after payment.

Electronics is approaching a major paradigm shift because silicon transistor scaling no longer yields historical energy-efficiency benefits, spurring research towards beyond-silicon nanotechnologies. In particular, carbon nanotube field-effect transistor (CNFET)-based digital circuits promise substantial energy-efficiency benefits, but the inability to perfectly control intrinsic nanoscale defects and variability in carbon nanotubes has precluded the realization of very-large-scale integrated systems. Here we overcome these challenges to demonstrate a beyond-silicon microprocessor built entirely from CNFETs. This 16-bit microprocessor is based on the RISC-V instruction set, runs standard 32-bit instructions on 16-bit data and addresses, comprises more than 14,000 complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor CNFETs and is designed and fabricated using industry-standard design flows and processes. We propose a manufacturing methodology for carbon nanotubes, a set of combined processing and design techniques for overcoming nanoscale imperfections at macroscopic scales across full wafer substrates. This work experimentally validates a promising path towards practical beyond-silicon electronic systems.

Nature, doi:10.1038/s41586-019-1493-8