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Noise powered nano devices EC workshop on Molecular-scale Information Systems Brussels, 30-1-2008 Luca Gammaitoni N.i.P.S Laboratory, Dipartimento di Fisica Università degli Studi di Perugia and INFN Perugia (Italy) Brussels, 30-1-2008 1 1. Challenge The challenge is to realize self-powered nanoscale electronic devices. State of the art: On Google: 29,000 for "nanoscale electronic devices" On Google: close to none for - ”powering nanoscale electronic devices” - ”powered nanoscale electronic devices” - ”self-powering nanoscale electronic devices” -… This challenge clearly address the problem of energy conversion in nano-scale IT devices and systems. Brussels, 30-1-2008 2 1. Challenge The challenge is to realize self-powered nanoscale electronic devices. Self-powered means energetically autonomous devices capable of harvesting energy from the environment. Different approaches: 1) Energy produced in one central place: battery-like 2) Energy produced on-board when and where necessary 3) Energy produced when and where available (and locally stored) Brussels, 30-1-2008 3 1. Challenge The challenge is to realize self-powered nanoscale electronic devices. At the micro-to-nano scales most of the energy available is kinetic energy present in the form of random fluctuations, i.e. noise. Thus the challenge is to: use the noise to power nano-scale devices aimed at Sensing/computing/acting and communicating. Brussels, 30-1-2008 4 1. Challenge The challenge is to realize self-powered nanoscale electronic devices. Random vibrations / noise Thermal noise Acoustic noise Seismic noise Ambient noise (wind, pressure fluctuations, …) Man made vibrations (human motion, machine vibrations,…) All different for intensity, spectrum, statistics Not only kinetic energy… Brussels, 30-1-2008 5 1. Challenge The challenge is to realize self-powered nanoscale electronic devices. Why is this an opportunity? Exploiting environment noise to produce electric energy is an interesting opportunity to foster the research in designing and producing nano-scale devices. It is a smart environment-aware solution. It can be made bio-compatible. Brussels, 30-1-2008 6 1. Challenge The challenge is to realize self-powered nanoscale electronic devices. Why now/in-the-near-future ? Bottlenecks removed 1) New paradigma for the role of noise. 2) New solutions for nano-scale energy harvesting. Brussels, 30-1-2008 7 Bottlenecks removed 1) New paradigma for the role of noise. The role of noise has been promoted from simple disturb to potentially fruitful resource, due to progresses in nonlinear stochastic dynamics. Phenomena like “Stochastic Resonance” and “thermal ratchets” have popularized the idea that noise can be exploited to produce improvements in system performances. Brussels, 30-1-2008 8 Nano systems affected by noise Brussels, 30-1-2008 See SUBTLE: SUB KT Transistors and Sensors, FPVI FET 9 Bottlenecks removed 2) New solutions for nano-scale energy harvesting. Nano-scale energy production has been demonstrated and new viable solutions have been presented. See e.g. Z L Wang and J H Song, 2006 Piezoelectric nanogenerators based on zinc oxide nanowire arrays Science, 312 242-246. ZnO nanowires Brussels, 30-1-2008 10 3. Impact The impact is hardly overestimated Basic science: Advances in nano-scale energy-conversion mechanisms. Advances in nonlinear stochastic dynamics: the usual vibration-to-electricity conversion mechanisms are based on linear oscillators tuned to the frequency of vibration sources. New approaches could take advantage of nonlinear dynamics to improve the efficiency of the conversion mechanism. Preliminary results indicate that the gain can be up to a factor 5 (i.e. 500%) in power. Brussels, 30-1-2008 11 3. Impact The impact is hardly overestimated Technology: The availability of onboard power generators will open up the possibility of building nano-scale devices (from sensors/ actuators to computing/communicating) with application in a vast number of fields. ICT technology can be seriously affected by such possibility. Brussels, 30-1-2008 12 3. Impact The impact is hardly overestimated Economy: The impact on the economy of ICT can be very relevant. A new class of devices, up to now only dreamt of, could be made available for practical applications. Society: The impact on society can be extremely relevant for a number of fields. Among these: wireless communications and social behaviours, human health remote monitoring and control, remote sensing, environmental control, privacy and security,… Brussels, 30-1-2008 13 5. Communities It is clearly a multidisciplinary area, where physics, chemistry, electronic engineering, signal analysis and mathematics play each their own role, under the more general umbrella of ICT. The topic is of interest for different research communities: - the nanotechnology comm. interested in new information oriented devices. - computer science community (wireless sensor networks) - nonlinear stochastic dynamics community - the electronic eng. devoted to powering solutions design - … Brussels, 30-1-2008 14