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Technology

Wireless revolution may reach inside microchips

By Colin Barras

26 May 2010

WIRELESS technology is often credited with making us more productive. Now it looks like it could also improve the inner workings of our computers. Wireless transmission may become the most efficient method of moving data the length of tiny processors.

Microchips continue to become more powerful as designers find ways to cram greater numbers of transistors into tighter spaces. But in those cramped conditions the electronic signals sent down metal wires – the interconnects between transistors – can suffer interference, degrading performance. The answer is to go wireless, claim Nader Engheta at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, and Andrea Alù

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