KAUST leads development of prototype 2D microchip

According to the team, their breakthrough demonstrates the potential of 2D materials to expand the functionality and performance of microchip-based technologies.

Functional microdevices based on 2D materials have proved elusive due to the challenges in fabricating and handling such fragile thin films.

Inspired by recent achievements in Mario Lanza’s lab on functional 2D films, the KAUST-led collaboration has now produced and demonstrated a prototype 2D-based microchip. The team’s findings have been published in Nature.

“Our motivation was to increase the technology readiness level of 2D material-based electronic devices and circuits by using conventional silicon-based CMOS microcircuits as a base and standard semiconductor fabrication techniques,” Lanza said in a statement. “The challenge, however, is that synthetic 2D materials can contain local defects such as atomic impurities that can cause small devices to fail. Also, it is very difficult to integrate the 2D material into the microchip without damaging it.”

The research team is said to have optimised the design of the chip to make it easier to fabricate and minimise the effect of defects. According to KAUST, they did this by fabricating standard complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) transistors on one side of the chip and feeding interconnects through to the underside, where the 2D material could be transferred in small pads less than 0.25μm across.