UCLA scientists and engineers have developed a new process for assembling semiconductor devices. The advance could lead to much more energy-e?cient transistors for electronics and computer chips, diodes for solar cells, light-emitting diodes, and other semiconductor-based devices.
Their method joins a semiconductor layer and a metal electrode layer without the atomic-level defects that typically occur when other processes are used to build semiconductor-based devices. Even though those defects are minuscule, they can trap electrons traveling between the semiconductor and the adjacent metal electrodes, which makes the devices less e?cient than they could be. The electrodes in semiconductor-based devices are what enable electrons to travel to and from the semiconductor; the electrons can carry computing information or energy to power a device.
via NASA Tech Briefs https://ift.tt/2BVPq4O
August 8, 2018 at 02:48PM