4 ms·

Very neat. Dealing with a thermal problem in a design right now at work; wish these were available for an 802.11 radio!

namibj 8y ago
The issue is that your 802.11 radio needs digital logic, whereas this is just a dumb mixer. Which is, conceptually, just a dual-gate MOSFET run with a bias voltage to exhibit linearity and often without the body diode, in order to permit AC inputs. I do hope for SiC based VLSI, but this won't happen any time soon. One could probably run them pretty hot though, possibly without special cooling fans or such, or at temperatures that allow radiating the generated heat away into space, as long as it's not needed/used for anything better. This would also allow the recycling of waste heat from electronics for industrial processes and generating steam, for which we already know pretty well how to pipe it across a city in a city-scale central heating system. Absorption cooling (often using ammonia/water as a mixture) could be powered by this and provide sufficiently low temperatures for airflow-free cooling of e.g. hard discs or other components where the temperature would kill them.
- dzdt 8y ago
  I think the VLSI is coming sooner than you expect! There are already teams trying to build a 4 bit microprocessor. And when they get the layering and packaging working, scaling is going to go a LOT faster than Moore's law did because so much of the technology from silicon will just be reusable. [1] http://www.imapsource.org/doi/abs/10.4071/2016-HITEC-242?code=imap-site http://www.imapsource.org/doi/abs/10.4071/2016-HITEC-242?cod... [2] https://www.lpi.usra.edu/vexag/meetings/archive/vexag_14/presentations/21-Zetterling%20-SiC-Electronics.pdf https://www.lpi.usra.edu/vexag/meetings/archive/vexag_14/pre...
  - namibj 8y ago
    Thanks. Any predictions? How long until we get a 486 in SiC?
- cushychicken 8y ago
  Didn't realize this was silicon carbide - didn't read original article too closely. I used to work with a guy who did a lot of formative work with SiC.
  - namibj 8y ago
    SiC is used in the field for HVDC inverters, as it can be driven harder and the cooling is less critical. The difference seems to be that they got an RF mixer, while we currently don't use lithography finer than what I can do with a ruler, masking tape and an exacto knife.

The issue is that your 802.11 radio needs digital logic, whereas this is just a dumb mixer. Which is, conceptually, just a dual-gate MOSFET run with a bias voltage to exhibit linearity and often without the body diode, in order to permit AC inputs. I do hope for SiC based VLSI, but this won't happen any time soon. One could probably run them pretty hot though, possibly without special cooling fans or such, or at temperatures that allow radiating the generated heat away into space, as long as it's not needed/used for anything better. This would also allow the recycling of waste heat from electronics for industrial processes and generating steam, for which we already know pretty well how to pipe it across a city in a city-scale central heating system. Absorption cooling (often using ammonia/water as a mixture) could be powered by this and provide sufficiently low temperatures for airflow-free cooling of e.g. hard discs or other components where the temperature would kill them.

dzdt 8y ago
I think the VLSI is coming sooner than you expect! There are already teams trying to build a 4 bit microprocessor. And when they get the layering and packaging working, scaling is going to go a LOT faster than Moore's law did because so much of the technology from silicon will just be reusable. [1] http://www.imapsource.org/doi/abs/10.4071/2016-HITEC-242?code=imap-site http://www.imapsource.org/doi/abs/10.4071/2016-HITEC-242?cod... [2] https://www.lpi.usra.edu/vexag/meetings/archive/vexag_14/presentations/21-Zetterling%20-SiC-Electronics.pdf https://www.lpi.usra.edu/vexag/meetings/archive/vexag_14/pre...
- namibj 8y ago
  Thanks. Any predictions? How long until we get a 486 in SiC?
cushychicken 8y ago
Didn't realize this was silicon carbide - didn't read original article too closely. I used to work with a guy who did a lot of formative work with SiC.
- namibj 8y ago
  SiC is used in the field for HVDC inverters, as it can be driven harder and the cooling is less critical. The difference seems to be that they got an RF mixer, while we currently don't use lithography finer than what I can do with a ruler, masking tape and an exacto knife.