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Category: computing – Page 632

Highlights of the day: Chinese phone vendors developing own 5G chips

MediaTek and Qualcomm may be the dominant players in the 5G smartphone SoC sector, but Chinese phone vendors Oppo and Xiaomi are mounting a challenge by developing their own chips. Shortages plaguing the semidoncutor industry are sending firms scrambling for supply. NOR flash chipmakers say that more of their clients are now willing to strike long-term supply contracts. For backend firms, demand from MCU clients remains robust.

Unisoc, Oppo, Xiaomi gearing up for new 5G mobile chips roll-outs: Oppo and Xiaomi will introduce their in-house-developed sub-6GHz 5G chip solutions between late 2021 and early 2022, joining fabless chipmaker Unisoc in competing against chip vendors such as Qualcomm and MediaTek, according to industry sources in Taiwan.

NOR flash chipmakers see more customers eager for long-term deals: Taiwan-based NOR flash chipmakers have seen more of their clients eager to strike long-term supply agreements, according to industry sources.

Monkey uses brain implants to play Pong

Neuralink, co-founded by Elon Musk in 2016, has revealed a macaque with chips embedded on each side of its brain, playing a mind-controlled version of the 1972 video game, Pong.

Although established in 2016, Neuralink remained secretive about its work until July 2019, when Musk presented his concept for a new brain–machine interface (BMI). Not only would this help physically diseased or injured people, Musk believed it could also treat mental illness – and even be used by healthy individuals who might wish to enhance themselves.

A prototype in August 2020 demonstrated the Neuralink technology in a pig. This coin-sized chip, featuring a read/write link, contained 1024 channels with a wireless megabit data rate and all-day battery life. Brain signals conveying the pig’s sense of smell could be seen in real time. The FDA had by then approved it as a breakthrough device, allowing use in limited human trials under the US federal guidelines for testing medical devices.

The Near-Magical Mystery of Quasiparticles

Using intuition, educated guesswork and computer simulations, condensed matter physicists have become better at figuring out which quasiparticles are theoretically possible. Meanwhile in the lab, as physicists push novel materials to new extremes, the quasiparticle zoo has grown quickly and become more and more exotic. “It really is a towering intellectual achievement,” said Natelson.

Recent discoveries include pi-tons, immovable fractons and warped wrinklons. “We now think about quasiparticles with properties that we never really dreamt of before,” said Steve Simon, a theoretical condensed matter physicist at the University of Oxford.

Here are a few of the most curious and potentially useful quasiparticles.

Ibm, Nvidia Form Strategic Alliance

Vendor Spotlight

IBM and NVIDIA announced the two companies have formed a multi-year strategic alliance under which IBM will manufacture NVIDIA’s next-generation GeForce graphics processor units (GPUs).

State-of-the-art GPUs, like NVIDIA’s Geforce FX, have become process and manufacturing drivers. To deliver the immense computational power needed to create cinematic images in real-time, NVIDIA’s GPUs require the most sophisticated process technologies.

Physicists working with Microsoft think the universe is a self-learning computer

A team of theoretical physicists working with Microsoft today published an amazing pre-print research paper describing the universe as a self-learning system of evolutionary laws.

In other words: We live inside a computer that learns.

The big idea: Bostrom’s Simulation Argument has been a hot topic in science circles lately. We published “What if you’re living in a simulation, but there’s no computer” recently to posit a different theory, but Microsoft’s pulled a cosmic “hold my beer” with this paper.

Honeywell releases details of its ion trap quantum computer

About a year ago, Honeywell announced that it had entered the quantum computing race with a technology that was different from anything else on the market. The company claimed that because the performance of its qubits was so superior to those of its competitors, its computer could do better on a key quantum computing benchmark than quantum computers with far more qubits.

Now, roughly a year later, the company finally released a paper describing the feat in detail. But in the meantime, the competitive landscape has shifted considerably.

Researchers realize resonant tunnelling diodes based on twisted black phosphorus homostructures

In recent years, electronics engineers worldwide have been trying to develop new semiconductor heterostructure devices using atomically thin materials. Among the many devices that can be fabricated using these materials are resonant tunneling diodes, which typically consist of a quantum-well structure placed between two barrier layers.

Past research has shown that stacking two-dimensional (2D) layers that are twisted in relation to each other can enhance or suppress the interlayer coupling at their interface. This suppression or enhancement can in turn modulate the electronic, optical and mechanical properties of the resulting .

For instance, some studies found that the intralayer current transport in small angle twisted bilayer graphene prompted some exotic phenomena, such as superconductivity and ferromagnetism. These observations inspired a fundamentally new approach to device engineering, known as ‘twistronics’ (i.e., twist electronics).

Microsoft adopts boiling liquid to cool datacenter servers

Microsoft has implemented boiling liquid to help keep datacenter servers at reasonable temperatures. The company uses electronic equipment and liquid capable of boiling at 122 degrees Farenheit, 90 degrees below the boiling point of water.

Once the processors within the datacenters reach a certain temperature due to labor, the boiling effect moves heat away from the servers. This movement allows the processors to continue operating at full power without the risk of failure from overheating.

Microsoft engineered this solution using a tank that takes the fluid vapor from its liquid contents and exposes the mist to a cooling lid. This process transforms that vapor back into liquid and rain down onto the servers in order to cool the machines. This process of vaporization and condensation for cooling is known as a closed loop cooling system.

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