Peer inside an antique radio and you’ll find what look like small light bulbs. They’re actually vacuum tubes — the predecessors of the silicon transistor. Vacuum tubes went the way of the dinosaurs in the 1960s, but researchers have now brought them back to life, creating a nano-sized version that’s faster and hardier than the transistor. It’s even able to survive the harsh radiation of outer space.
The new device is a cross between today’s transistors and the vacuum tubes of yesteryear. It’s small and easily manufactured, but also fast and radiation-proof. Meyyappan, who co-developed the nano vacuum tube
, says it is created by etching a tiny cavity in phosphorous-doped silicon. The cavity is bordered by three electrodes: a source, a gate, and a drain. The source and drain are separated by just 150 nanometres, while the gate sits on top. Electrons are emitted from the source thanks to a voltage applied across it and the drain, while the gate controls the electron flow across the cavity. In their paper published online today in Applied Physics Letters, Meyyappan and colleagues estimate that their nano vacuum tube operates at frequencies up to 0.46 terahertz — some 10 times faster than the best silicon transistors — via redwolf.newsvine.com
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