interdigitated transducer tagged posts

Acoustic waveguide channels phonons into the optomechanical cavity, enabling the group to manipulate the motion of the suspended nanoscale beam directly. Credit: K. Balram/K. Srinivasan/NIST

A system based on this design could move and store information in next-generation computers. While Moore’s Law, the idea that the number of transistors on an integrated circuit will double every 2 years, has proven remarkably resilient, engineers will soon begin to encounter fundamental limits. As transistors shrink, heat and other factors will begin to have magnified effects in circuits. So researchers are considering designs in which electronic components interface with other physical systems that carry information such as light and sound...