Emerging Nanoelectronic Devices

20ITRS Assessment and Benchmarking of Emerging Logic Devices

Shamik Das

Nanosystems Group, The MITRE Corporation, USA

20.1 Introduction

This chapter provides a brief review of the assessment and benchmarking of logic devices presented in the 2011 edition of the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) [1] chapter on Emerging Research Devices (ERD) [2]. The objectives of the ITRS ERD roadmap are to review recent research in devices beyond silicon transistors and to forecast the development of novel logic switches that might replace the silicon transistor as the device driving technological development within the semiconductor industry.

Overt emphasis on emerging devices within the ITRS began with the 2003 edition, at which time it was envisioned that new technologies would be required to sustain the scaling of complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) electronics down to the 22-nm node and beyond [3]. At present, 10 years later, 22-nm CMOS is commercially available, and further conventional scaling is envisioned that will enable transistor manufacturing down to the 7-nm or even the 5-nm node [4]. Nonetheless, it is absolutely certain that the avenues for continued conventional scaling are limited and dwindling, and therefore that alternatives to CMOS must be developed if the economic model of exponential scaling is to be sustained over the longer term. The ITRS presents a progression of such alternatives that depart increasingly from conventional device ...