A thin slice of carbon atoms may trigger a revolution in electronics. “For me it’s like the Wright Brothers’ flight”

Semiconductors are materials that conduct electricity well under certain conditions and behave like insulators (bodies that do not conduct electricity) under others. Today, semiconductors are the basis for the construction of all electronic devices, including computers. Researchers believe they have a good chance of making a revolution in this field.

Scientists are talking about a breakthrough. They discovered a new semiconductor based on graphene

The problem, however, is that for further development of technology, i.e. increasing computing power and (often simultaneous) miniaturization of electronic components, a new material with better properties is needed. Now researchers have managed to make a breakthrough in this field. A team of scientists led by , a professor of physics from the Georgia Institute of Technology in the USA, has created the world’s first functional semiconductor made of graphene, which has capabilities many times better than materials made of silicon. Graphene, which has long been talked about in the context of applications in electronics, is an extremely thin structure (resembling a honeycomb), composed of carbon atoms, in which the bonds are exceptionally strong.

As researchers write in their published work, the new material is the first graphene semiconductor compatible with conventional microelectronics processing methods, which is a necessary condition for it to be used in practice. Scientists have overcome the biggest obstacle that has been keeping graphene researchers awake at night for years – they managed to obtain the so-called bandgap (or forbidden gap – z) which, in contact with an electric field, allows or prevents the flow of current, depending on the need. As the Georgia Institute of Technology emphasizes, scientists have never managed to achieve this property in graphene materials before. In its natural form, graphene is not a semiconductor, but – like silicon – a semi-metal. It becomes so only after obtaining the mentioned bandgap.

As if that were not enough, the semiconductor created by Walter de Heer’s team has properties that are much better than semiconductors based on silicon. First of all, it was emphasized that the carrier mobility in the graphene semiconductor is 10 times better than in silicon materials.

Now we have an extremely durable graphene semiconductor with 10 times greater mobility than silicon and unique properties not available in silicon. But the story of our work over the last 10 years has been: ‘Can we make this material good enough to work with?’

– writes Walter de Heer quoted from Georgia Tech. The physicist studied the first potential semiconductors based on carbon atoms at the beginning of his career in 2001.

This could be a revolution. We won’t go any further without a new semiconductor

Constantly progressing miniaturization, increasing power and reducing power consumption (and, at the same time, the amount of heat released) have pushed silicon-based semiconductors to the limits of their capabilities. Further development therefore requires the use of a new material that will have better properties and greater durability. The former can, in turn, be used in work on subsequent technologies, primarily in the still fledgling quantum computers.

Walter de Heer emphasizes that work on the graphene semiconductor “took a very, very long time”, but perhaps it will enable the transition to the next stage in the development of electronics. The scientist notes that before silicon there were, among others, vacuum tubes or telegraphs, and the next step may be graphene.

To me, it’s like a Wright Brothers moment. They built a plane that could fly 300 feet [91 metrów – red.] in air. Skeptics asked why the world needed airplanes when high-speed trains and boats already existed. But they did not give up and created the beginnings of technology that today can transport people across oceans

– says de Heer.