Applications: Nanoelectronics and Nanomagnetics

Abstract

In the last ten years, the state of the art in nanoelectronics, including nanomagnetics, has rapidly gone from devices at or above 100 nm in size to the realm of 30 nm and below, with a well-defined pathway to devices (including transistors for logic and memory) of about 15 nm. In the process of reaching this size, the thickness of the critical layers in many structures is approaching 1 nm; the threshold voltage of a metal-oxide semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET) device is now controlled by fewer than 100 atoms, and the line edge roughness requirements are a few nanometers. All of these advances have resulted in an increased demand for near-atomic-level control for deposition, patterning, and characterization.