23 October 2007
A glimpse into the future of mobile phones and other portable electronic devices has been granted by researchers at the University of Edinburgh.
New techniques have been developed by the Edinburgh team, in collaboration with international colleagues at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and the University of Rome, which could see much smaller microchips being built in future.
This would result in much thinner and more powerful mobile phones and handheld PCs being developed - with technology firms able to manipulate wires as small as 1,000 times thinner than a human hair.
The Edinburgh researchers analysed the behaviour of the extremely thin wires using computer models in their study.
Electronic engineer at the University Dr Michael Zaiser commented: "Basically, we just tried to look at what would happen if we deformed a wire that is very, very small.
"What we found is when we made these wires smaller and smaller they started to behave in a very funny way."
It is hoped that this information will help technology firms to better handle the thin wires in order to develop the smaller chips.
© 2008 Adfero Ltd
Content for the uSwitch.com market news service is provided by a third party, Adfero Ltd. Whilst uSwitch.com makes reasonable efforts to check the reliability of this content, uSwitch.com does not guarantee the accuracy thereof or endorse the views or opinions given by Adfero Ltd, unless expressly stated otherwise.