No need to bond different semiconductors... Sookmyung Women's University develops key technology for next-generation low-power semiconductors

[Financial News] Sookmyung Women's University announced on the 12th that a team of professors Min-gyu Joo and Chang-hyeon Ko from its Department of Applied Physics, in collaboration with France's National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), had succeeded in demonstrating a key phenomenon for next-generation low-power semiconductors using just one type of thin semiconductor material, without complexly joining different semiconductors.
The achievement is seen as a technology that could accelerate the commercialization of next-generation electronic devices that use less electricity by significantly simplifying the manufacturing process while improving power efficiency.
The key technology demonstrated by the research team is “negative differential resistance.” Normally, when the voltage of an electronic device increases, so does the current. But with this phenomenon, the current instead decreases in a certain range even as the voltage rises. This property makes it possible to process multiple levels of signals simultaneously, moving beyond the conventional approach in which a single semiconductor device processes only two signals, “0” and “1,” and can therefore dramatically reduce power consumption.
Until now, the phenomenon was typically produced by stacking and joining multiple semiconductors with different properties. However, this approach made it difficult to precisely control the interfaces where different materials meet and had the drawback of complicating the manufacturing process.
Instead of joining multiple semiconductors, the research team used just one semiconductor: “multilayer tungsten diselenide.” They took advantage of the material's property of retaining, for a certain period, traces of previous electrical stimuli (voltage) applied to it. They confirmed that applying a voltage in the opposite direction beforehand and then changing the voltage causes charges within the material to shift, naturally reducing the current.
By also enhancing electrical stability by coating the semiconductor's surface with a special protective film (PMMA), the team succeeded in achieving current efficiency that far surpassed previous studies even at room temperature, with a peak-to-valley current ratio of up to 42.9.
Professor Min-gyu Joo said, “This result demonstrates that high performance can be achieved by electrically controlling the charge state within a single semiconductor without joining different semiconductor materials.” He added, “If we optimize the device structure going forward, it could be used as a next-generation electronic device for low-power information processing.”
Meanwhile, the findings, to which Eun-ji Shim, a student in the Department of Applied Physics, contributed as first author, have been accepted for publication in ACS Nano, an international journal in the field of nanoscience.  

[email protected] Kim Man-gi Reporter