Research update: Chips with self-assembling rectangles
Researchers at MIT have developed a new approach to creating the complex array of wires and connections on microchips, using a system of self-assembling polymers. The work could eventually lead to a way of making more densely packed components on memory chips and other devices.The new method — developed by MIT visiting doctoral student Amir Tavakkoli of the National University of Singapore, along with two other graduate students and three professors in MIT’s departments of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) and Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE) — is described in a paper to be published this August in the journal Advanced Materials; the paper is available online now.The process is closely related to a method the same team described last month in a paper in Science, which makes it possible to produce three-dimensional configurations of wires and connections using a similar system of self-assembling polymers.In the new paper, the...