Diamonds are not only a girl’s best friend; they could turn out to be a computer’s best friend. Researchers all over the world are in a mad race to develop the world’s first super-computer chip built not on silicon technology – but on diamond technology.
Since the development of silicon technology, scientists have been trying to figure out how to overcome the limitations of the silicon chip. Although silicon development turned the computer industry on its head and made vast improvements in computer processing capabilities, diamond technology will create super-computers that will out-perform any top-notch computer in existence.
Damon Jackson is just one researcher who has been exploring the possibilities of the next big wave of computer technology advancement. He says that diamond will likely be a common material found in every computer built in the next five or ten years.
The development of the silicon chip greatly improved processing capabilities; it has been plagued with shortcomings as well. One of the shortcomings noted in silicon chips is the high-temperature created with the millions of transistors that provide power, as electricity passes through them. Diamonds will handle the mass of activity with improved speed and tolerate high temperatures better than silicon chips.
The strength and high melting point of diamonds far surpasses what silicon can deliver, making it a natural resource for computer processors. However, it has not been without its challenges to blend the world of diamonds with computers – although the benefits have been known for years.
As scientists continue to research how best to integrate the potential of diamonds to improve computer processing with the greatest reliability and capacity, it is assured that technology will shift from improving the silicon chip to creating the world’s best diamond chip.
Blending the ideal characteristics of diamonds with computers has long been the prediction of many computer scientists. In 1990, John Venables, an advisor at the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, predicted that computers would be using diamonds to provide solutions to the computer technology challenges.
Although Venables does not expect diamond technology to be used in personal computing, at least in the near future, he does expect it to be used in specialized computing. For instance, development of diamond chips would be ideal for satellite computer chips, since there is the challenge of dissipating heat in space.
With satellites costing in the millions and hundreds of millions of dollars, it may seem like a minor aspect to deal with an overheating chip, but the chip is the processing lifeline of any computer. When the chip fails, so does the entire computer. Repairing a multi-million dollar satellite in space is not exactly cheap.
Using diamond technology in satellites will allow scientists to build computing systems that provide improved processing capabilities and reliability.
Research and development has not been the only challenge with creating diamond chips, the other challenge has been cost. Diamonds are rare and the costs are astounding, at least in the initial cost. Although diamond chips carry a large initial expensive, once it is put in place, the cost per unit drops significantly.
With improved performance and greater reliability, the post-production costs are lower than that of traditional silicon chips. Of course, the solution is to create synthetic diamonds that can be manufactured – eliminating the need to mine expensive natural diamonds.
Researcher Damon Jackson has discovered a way to do that. Taking a natural diamond and putting circuits on it, he then sends it to the University of Birmingham in Alabama, where Professor Yogesh Vohra has patented a process to grow synthetic diamonds. Sounds futuristic, but it is done by essentially cooking methane and hydrogen gases in a very hot microwave oven.
Vohra does not think the technology is so futuristic. In fact, he sees the eventual development of man-made diamond chip with the circuitry also made of diamonds. Vohra’s patented process has created the Livermore jewel – a man-made diamond layer that houses circuitry. Although proven, he predicts that the first real functioning diamond chip in a computer remains five or ten years out.
The recent advancements and success of manufactured diamonds for computer applications has caught the attention of several technology firms who are scrambling to become the first to manufacture diamond chips. While great attention has been given to silicon chip advancement that is likely to slow over the coming years as more focus is redirected to diamond chip development.
Scientists are also working on other developments to provide greater processing capacity, including carbon-based materials. Computer technology is scrambling to fulfill Moore’s Law, which predicted computing power would double roughly every two years. That is no small feat to accomplish, as developments provide greater gaps between traditional and new computer systems.
One thing is for certain, man-made diamond development for the computing industry will ensure the development of super computers that out-perform and out-last any computer previously built.
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