OVERALL GOAL + JUSTIFICATION

This Path aims at establishing a sustainable research platform for carbon-based electronics with initial focus on a CNTFET technology for wireless communication systems. This platform will allow the design and fabrication of integrated CNTFET based circuits with competitive performance and distinctive features (such as high linearity) compared to incumbent technologies. Thus, our approach significantly contributes to advancing electronics beyond CMOS.

The Path demonstrator will be an integrated CNTFET receiver working in the 2 GHz band. As linearity is very important for current wireless standards implementation, this is an interesting target for studying the linearity properties expected from CNTFETs. Depending on the device performance achieved during the technology development, the consideration of higher frequencies is very likely. To achieve the goals, we combine the extensive and complementary multi-disciplinary CNTFET competences in Dresden and Chemnitz covering materials science, multi-scale device modeling, RF circuit design and fabrication, and wireless communications.

Cooperation is targeted with several cluster Paths including the Silicon Nanowire, HAEC, Organic/Polymer Path, Resilience and Biomolecular-Assembled Circuits Paths. The knowledge and methods gained can be transferred to other carbon technologies, such as graphene, when the time is right.