3D nanochips to replace flash?

Science Daily reports.

James Tour, who leads the research team at the American Chemical Society, said devices with these chips could retain data despite an accidental trip through the dryer - or even a voyage to Mars. And with a unique 3D internal architecture, the new chips could pack extra gigabytes of data while taking up less space.

Tour says the chips store two terminals per bit of information rather than the standard three terminals per bit, and are said to make more sense for 3D memory than flash drives, Tom's Hardware states.

"These new chips are really big for the electronics industry because they are now looking for replacements for flash memory," explains Tour.

"These new memory chips have numerous advantages over the chips today that are workhorses for data storage in hundreds of millions of flash, or thumb drives, smartphones, computers and other products. Flash has about another six or seven years in which it can be built smaller, but then developers hit fundamental barriers," he adds.

The chips comprised a thin layer of silicon oxide with two terminals, no metal at all, and the silicon nano-crystal pathway is extremely small on the scale of five nanometres, Extreme Tech says.

Tour says the technology is patented and that he's talking to original equipment manufacturers in the hope of getting the 3D memory into products.