Post-Quantum Cryptography


Quantum computing is increasingly seen as a threat to communications security: rapid progress towards realizing practical quantum computers has drawn attention to the long understood potential of such machines to break fundamentals of contemporary cryptographic infrastructure. While this potential is so far firmly theoretical, the cryptography community is preparing for this possibility by deve... » read more

Emergent magnetic monopoles isolated using quantum-annealing computer


Using D-Wave’s quantum-annealing computer, Los Alamos National Laboratory has shown that it’s possible to isolate magnetic monopoles. This research could one day enable future nanomagnets.   Abstract: "Artificial spin ices are frustrated spin systems that can be engineered, wherein fine tuning of geometry and topology has allowed the design and characterization of exotic eme... » read more

The Great Quantum Computing Race


Quantum computing is heating up, as a growing number of entities race to benchmark, stabilize, and ultimately commercialize this technology. As of July 2021, a group from China appears to have taken the lead in terms of raw performance, but Google, IBM, Intel and other quantum computer developers aren’t far behind. All of that could change overnight, though. At this point, it's too early t... » read more

Where Imperfections Lead To Opportunity


By Evelyn Hu It is natural to hold a bias that assumes that the highest-quality devices are those formed from the most perfect materials (crystalline, well-ordered, stoichiometric). Therefore, it is ironic, and perhaps counterintuitive, that particular kinds of defects, such as vacancies (missing atoms) in semiconductor materials, can form the building blocks of a new quantum information tec... » read more

Security In FPGAs And SoCs


Chip security is becoming a bigger problem across different markets, with different emerging standards and more sophisticated attacks. Jason Moore, senior director of engineering at Xilinx, talks with Semiconductor Engineering about current and future threats and what can be done about them. » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Feb. 16


Hybrid bonding consortium for packaging A*STAR’s Institute of Microelectronics (IME) and several companies have formed a new consortium to propel the development of hybrid bonding technology for chip-packaging applications. The group, called the Chip-to-Wafer (C2W) Hybrid Bonding Consortium, includes A*STAR’s IME organization, Applied Materials, ASM Pacific, Capcon, HD MicroSystems, ONT... » read more

The Chip Industry’s Next-Gen Roadmap


Todd Younkin, the new president and chief executive of the Semiconductor Research Corp. (SRC), sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to talk about engineering careers, R&D trends and what’s ahead for chip technologies over the next decade. What follows are excerpts of that conversation. SE: As a U.S.-based chip consortium, what is SRC's charter? Younkin: The Semiconductor Research... » read more

Startup Funding: December 2020


AI hardware startups were hot in our December startup-funding focus, with two companies landing rounds exceeding $100M and plenty of others seeing investment. Two Chinese EDA companies received funding in a bid to boost the country's semiconductor ecosystem. One company providing control systems for fabs achieved $8M in Series A, and both autonomous driving and electric vehicles pulled in lots ... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: Jan. 5


Quiet qubits Researchers at the University of New South Wales Sydney recorded the lowest noise levels yet for a semiconductor qubit. Charge noise caused by material imperfections interferes with the information encoded on qubits, reducing accuracy. "The level of charge noise in semiconductor qubits has been a critical obstacle to achieving the accuracy levels we need for large-scale error-c... » read more

Startup Funding: November 2020


Numerous chipmakers pulled in funding in November 2020, with investors putting money into interconnects, memories, AI hardware, and quantum computing. Launching from stealth was a startup aiming to combine AI and 5G. Autonomous delivery did well, too, with one company raising a massive $500M. This month, we take a look at 28 companies that raised a collective $1.1B. Semi & design Connec... » read more

← Older posts Newer posts →