FEEL

FEEL - Future Energy-Efficient Electronics 

Responsabile Locale: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The goal of this project is to develop new ideas for advancing the capabilities of superconducting digital logic beyond current state of the art. More specifically, the integration of nanowire logic memories and reversible computing Josephson logic will be explored. The aim is to provide a solid applied physical background on which base the development of future high-end computing systems. 

Superconducting nanowires are the heart of current advanced single photon detectors. They have a conductive state that is determined by a strong electro-thermal coupling, and can represent an alternative to Josephson based logic. The main advantages are submicron size, large signal amplitude and low energy dissipation. Basic amplification and logic functionalities have been already demonstrated, but the potential capabilities of this technology have not been explored to their full extend. In particular, the potential combination of electro-thermal and magnetic coupling is an important perspective for the realization of nanoscale memories. 

Another approach to reduce power dissipation is the so-called reversible computing. Its practical realization using the dynamics of magnetic flux-quanta in Josephson transmission lines or/and Josephson junctions arrays will be investigated. From the theoretical point of view the reversible circuits are connected to the foundations of the thermodynamics by relying heavily on the interplay between the information and entropy. An aspect that will be investigated is the role of fluctuations in the Landauer's principle, and thermodynamics of measurements, with extension to quantum measurements, about a minimal energy required to obtain the information in measurements.