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VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 1
Cooperative Spin/Nanomagnetic Architectures:
A Critical Evaluation
Supriyo Bandyopadhyay Dept. of Electrical & Computer Engineering
Virginia Commonwealth UniversityRichmond, VA 23284, USA
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 2
Why Spin At All?
Conventional electronics utilizes “charge” to store, process and communicate information.
Example: The MOSFET– when the channel is full of charge, the device is “on” and encodes logic bit 0. When the channel is depleted of charge, the device is “off” and encodes logic bit 1.
Switching from one bit to the other involves moving charges in or out of the channel, which causes a current (I) to flow with an associated power dissipation of IV or an energy dissipation of QV, where Q is the channel charge.
This dissipation is inevitable. Charge, being a scalar, only has magnitude and no direction. Therefore, different logic bits must be encoded in different amounts (or magnitude) of charge. Switching must involve changing the magnitude of the charge, which then invariably causes an energy dissipation of QV .
This is a fundamental shortcoming of all “Charge Based Electronics”.
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 3
Spin as a state vector to encode logic bits
Spin, unlike charge, is a pseudo vector with a fixed magnitude but variable polarization or “direction”.
Place a trapped or localized single electron in a dc magnetic field and the spin polarization becomes bistable: only polarizations parallel and anti-parallel to the field are eigenstates and are stable or metastable.
Encode logic bits in these two polarizations.
Switch by simply flipping the spin polarization, without physically moving the electron in space and causing a current flow. No QV dissipation
Low energy paradigm
1 0
Global dcMagnetic Field
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 4
Do SPINFETs and their cousins cause low energy dissipation as a result?
Absolutely not SPINFETs do not utilize the vector nature of spin to reduce energy
dissipation It is still very similar to a MOSFET, except that current is modulated
(transistor action realized) by changing spin polarization with a gate potential instead of changing carrier concentration in the channel
Information is still encoded in charge and current flows so that dissipation is not reduced at all
Comparison between SPINFETs and MOSFETs in APL, 85, 1433 (2004) SPINEFT loses
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 5
Single Spin NAND gate – no transistor business
Nearest neighbor exchange coupling J
Inputs applied through local magnetic field; gBBlocal >> J
J > gBBglobal
Anti-ferromagnetic ordering in ground state
Global field
input1 input2 output
0 0 1
1 1 0
1 0 1
0 1 1
Input1 Output Input2
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 6
Spin wire
Nearest neighbor exchange coupling
Information replicated in alternate dots
Fan out S. Bandyopadhyay, B.
Das and A. E. Miller, Nanotechnology, 5, 113 (1994)
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 7
The vexing issue of unidirectionality
Granular clocking Need 3-phase clock Propagates signal
unidirectionally and allows pipelining of data
S. Bandyopadhyay, Superlattices and Microstructures, 37, 77 (2005)
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 8
Rigorous quantum mechanical calculations of all the ground state configurations in the NAND gate, the gate error probability and energy dissipation can be found in
H. Agarwal, S. Pramanik and S. Bandyopadhyay, New J. Phys., 10, 015001.
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 9
The Good
Energy dissipated in switching a bit is kTln(1/p)… the Landauer Shannon limit! Here p is the bit error probability
With p = 10-9, the energy dissipated is 21 kT. Modern transistors dissipate 40,000-50,000 kT
Energy dissipated in the clock can be made arbitrarily small using adiabatic schemes
Very low power paradigm (very good)
Writing speed determined by ~ h/(2gBBlocal) = 0.7 psec with InSb q-dots if Blocal = 1 Tesla. Clock frequency is determined by how fast coupled spin system relaxes to ground state. About 1 nsec. Therefore, clock frequency is ~ 1 GHz.
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 10
The Bad
Temperature of operation is determined by the requirement 2J =gB Bglobal = kTln(1/p). With semiconductor quantum dots, J = 1 meV. Therefore, with p = 10-9, the temperature of operation is 1.1 K (very bad)
Room temperature operation requires J=0.3 eV. Maybe possible in molecules but certainly not in quantum dots
The global field required is 0.72 Tesla with InSb q-dots (not bad).
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 11
What about spontaneous spin flips causing bit errors?
1/1 T Textrinsicp e
… Assume 1 GHz clock. Then for p = 10-9, we need that the spin-flip time T1 should be 1 second!
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 12
Search for materials withlong spin relaxation times
Organics have weak spin orbit interaction and hence could have long spin lifetimes…but would it be as long as 1 second above 1.1 K?
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 13
Progress to date - experimental
T1 time measured 1 second at 100 K. Largest reported in any system.Nature Nanotech., 2, 216 (2007).
T2 time measured as 2 nsec at room temperature in Alq3 using ESR. At least 10 times larger than in inorganic materials. Possible phonon bottleneck effect.
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 14
Conclusions regarding SSL
Very low power Very low bit error probability Synthesis difficult, but has been repeatedly
demonstrated by many groups Single spin reading and writing repeatedly demonstrated
by many groups Requires low temperature because we cannot make the
exchange interaction very large Best platform may be organic semiconductors because
of the very long spin relaxation time
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 15
Other collective spin (or magnetic) approaches
Magnetic quantum cellular automata (originally Cowburn and Welland)
Spin wave based cellular non-linear networks (Khitun and Wang)
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 16
Magnetic quantum cellular automata
Shape anisotropy ensures that magnetization can point to the left (logic 0) or right (logic 1)
Apply a magnetic pulse (field pointing right) to set all dots to logic 1.
Apply an oscillating ac field whose negative phase represents logic 0 and positive phase logic 1. At the negative amplitude, the magnetization switches and points to left. DC component negative
If the initial magnetic pulse sets all dots to logic 0, then ac field has no effect
The magnetic pulse and the ac field are the two inputs. State of the dots is output. Realize the AND operation.
Cowburn and Welland, Science, 287, 1466 (2000)
Input 1
Input 2
Output
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 17
Magnetic quantum cellular automata
This is a single gate, NOT a circuit or architecture. No information “propagates” here
Hence, no issue of unidirectional signal propagation from one gate to another
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 20
Magnetic quantum cellular automata circuits(Scaled up version of SSL)
Csaba, Porod, Lugli, Csurgay, Int. J. Circuit Theory and Applications, 35, 281 (2007)
More of a circuit with signal propagation issues
Nanomagnetic dashes have shape anisotropy which makes magnetization bistable. Encode logic 0 and 1
1 0
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 21
Magnetic quantum cellular automata
Scaled up version of Single Spin Logic where the entire nanomagnet (consisting of about 10,000 spins) acts as a giant spin
Ground state is anti-ferromagnetic
Majority logic gate designed based on anti-ferromagnetic ordering Top view of majority
logic gate
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 22
Signal propagation
First apply a dc magnetic field to magnetize all dashes to the right
Then an input is applied to the leftmost dot
Next one flips, and then the next one, in a domino like fashion
Unidirectional propagation happens since there is an asymmetry between the state of the left neighbor and the state of the right, with the influence from left being stronger because of shape anisotropy that makes the vertical axis the easy axis of magnetization and the horizontal axis the hard axis
Initializing clock
Input applied
Shift register
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 23
The clock
Global clock, not granular… saves a lot of fabrication complexity
The price….. Non-pipelined architecture
The clock signal cannot reset all dash states until the final output has been produced
New input cannot be provided until the output has been produced
Initializing clock
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 24
What is a reasonable clock frequency?
The time to switch a nanomagnet is about 1 nsec Therefore, the minimum clock period is N nsec, where N
is the number of cells in a line Claim is that nanomagnets can be produced with a
density of at least 1010 cm-2, so that in a 10 cm2 chip, the longest line will have 3.16x105 cells
Therefore, the clock period is longer than 0.3 milliseconds
Clock frequency is limited to 3 kHz with this density… all because of non-pipelining
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 25
Granular versus global clock
Magnetic quantum cellular automata can be operated with a granular clock (see Behin-Aein, Salahuddin and Datta, arXiv:0804.1389). This will increase speed since it will allow pipelining. However, the penalty is generating a local magnetic field around each clock. Harder than the scheme in SSL
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 26
Other problems
In SSL, the nearest neighbor interaction is exchange which can be turned on or off by lowering or raising an electrostatic potential barrier between the neighboring cells. This requires a local electrostatic potential which can be applied via a simple gate pad.
In magnetic quantum cellular automata, the nearest neighbor interaction is dipole-dipole which cannot be turned on or off by lowering or raising an electrostatic potential barrier between neighboring cells. We need a local magnetic field to orient the magnetization of the selected nanomagnet. Much harder to generate a local magnetic field than to generate a local electric field.
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 27
The Killer… Clock Synchronization for a Vector Clock
SSL uses a scalar clock … potential MQCA uses a vector clock… magnetic
field The timing and direction of the field
has to be synchronized across the entire chip. Possible, in principle, for granular clock, but very difficult. Impossible for global clock
Misalignment problem will cause many cells to not flip, leading to severe bit errors
The only reported experiment reports a failure rate of 25%!
A bit error probability of 25% cannot be handled. It has to remain on the order of 10-6 or less
This problem alone can make MQCA impractical
tan
where is the ratio of the fields required
to magnetize along easy axis and hard axis
r
r
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 28
What about energy dissipation?
Energy dissipation to flip a nanomagnet with 104 spins is NOT 104 times the energy dissipated in flipping a single spin
Because of interactions between spins, it is much less. Salahuddin and Datta (APL, 90, 093503 (2007)) show that it is only about 35 times that of a single spin flip… Good news.
At room temperature, energy dissipated per bit flip is about 800 meV. Compare that with SSL where at 1.1 K, it was 2 meV. If MQCA were operated at 1.1 K, the energy dissipated per bit flip would have been ~ 4 meV. Thus, in terms of energy dissipation, MQCA is only slightly worse than SSL!
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 29
The good, the bad and the ugly
Good
Low energy, ~35 kT to switch. Also room temperature operation Bad
Slow, few kHz clock if globally clocked. Granular clocking is hard Ugly
Error probability very high because of the misalignment problem (synchronization of a vector clock). Bit error probability in the only experiment reported (Science, 311, 205 (2006)) was about 25%. We need it to be 10-6 or less.
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 31
The Spin Wave Bus: Another architecture
with actual signal propagation
Information transmitted by spin waves without charge transfer. Hence no current flows.
Is it energy efficient as a result? Depends on the dissipation of spin waves that carry information
Supposedly reduces interconnect problem. But this requires selectively directing the wave which will require a waveguide
Phase logic: phase is a continuous variable which can degrade due to dephasing. How is signal restoration performed. Need a “phase-device” with non-linear characteristic
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 32
Spin bus devices
Signal restoration at logic nodes requires a device with a non-linear characteristic for spin wave phase
Otherwise, use only for analog applications
Analogous to SAW devices
Input
Out
put
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 33
Other issues
Spin waves decay because of magnon emission (scattering with phonons is a secondary issue, primary issue is emission of magnons which carry away energy). Some amplification is necessary. What is a “spin-wave-amplifier”?
There are no local interconnects, only global interconnects via a spin wave bus, but how is selective coupling to devices accomplished? What is the coupling efficiency?
VCU
04/2002 2002/2003 page 34
CONCLUSIONS
• Single spin logic is low energy consuming, high speed (granular clock and pipelined) and high density. Fabrication challenging and low temperature operation
Magnetic quantum cellular automata can be operated at room temperature and low energy (not as low as SSL, but low). Cannot be “granular clocked”, at least not easily and hence non-pipelined and very slow. May be impractical because of large bit error probability
Spin wave bus may be low energy consuming but not as low as SSL or even MQCA. Room temperature operation possible. Probably reasonably fast. Not suitable for digital processing, may work well for analog processing