Terahertz CPUs
The chase for Gigahertz ended somewhat abruptly when AMD decided that the multi-core technology is the way to improve CPU speeds. Intel already hit the 4GHz barrier and was experiencing problems with the circuitry of those times, which wasn’t capable of providing stable results at +4 GHz. Everybody embraced the multi-core technology and the current maximum clocks swirl around 3 GHz. This is an energy efficient way, no doubt, but scientists already have ideas to ramp up the clock speed at a faster pace again. From their point of view, Terahertz CPUs may be within reach in the near future. This would be possible if the current electronic circuitry could be replaced by optical technology.
Remember what Intel’s Pat Gelsinger said back in 2001? He claimed that 30 to 40 GHz may be reached by 2010. He forgot to mention that those CPUs might require mini nuclear power plants to actually be of any use. Intel’s predictions are known to be quite inexact from time to time. Anyhow, Ajay Nahata, from University of Utah, predicts that in about ten years, CPUs could be running at Terahertz speeds witht the aid of some advanced far-infrared optical circuitry.
“Electronic circuits today work at gigahertz frequencies – billions of cycles per second,” Nahata stated. “[…]we’ve demonstrated the first step toward making circuits that use terahertz radiation and ultimately might work at terahertz speeds or a thousand times faster than today’s gigahertz-speed computers.”
The first setup that was used to achieve 0.3 THz speeds included pieces of stainless steel foil measuring 4” x 1” in area size and 625 microns thickness - or 6.25 times the thickness of a human hair. The scientists perforated the metal with rectangular holes, each measuring 500 microns by 50 microns. The rectangular holes were arranged side by side in three different patterns to form “wires” for terahertz radiation – one of which “successfully” carried terahertz radiation in a straight line, while other two changed the direction towards the terahertz radiation was moving through splitting or coupling.
This is only part of a scientific demonstration, but Nahata says there’s always room for improvement and in several years, the Terahertz barrier could be broken.
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