{ The demise of Conventional Computing? Bilal Kaleem, 1 st Year Physics

Technological stalemate?

Image : London Bridge, by Samuel Scott from the National Museums Liverpool collection. Let’s travel a bit back in time…. Not that far back, though…..

-2003 Finish Mobile Phone Giant – Nokia - launched the Nokia Largest ever selling phone in history. Rudimentary Features. Processor Speed of 60Mhz 4 Mb of Memory -Today Smartphones are light years ahead compared to their decade old counterparts. Much faster processors – about 40x Much larger memory capacities –about 8000x These allow for a whole cohort of resource – hungry applications.

A similar trend can be seen if we analyze how the processing power and the memory of personal computers have progressively increased, not only in the last decade, but since their invention. Processing power and memory capacity of devices using silicon-based microprocessors has increased approximately exponentially. In electronics, the processing power and memory capacity is directly related to the ‘number’ of circuit components that can be ‘squeezed’ in per area of a microprocessor.

This trend was predicted by Gordon E Moore in his famous 1965 paper “Cramming more components onto integrated circuits”, which is now colloquially known as Moore’s law–: “The complexity for minimum component costs has increased at a rate of roughly a factor of two per year. Certainly over the short term this rate can be expected to continue, if not to increase. Over the longer term, the rate of increase is a bit more uncertain, although there is no reason to believe it will not remain nearly constant for at least 10 years.” [1] Graph from Gordon Moore’s Paper which shows his prediction. Note that the y axis of the graph represents log base 2 of the number of circuit components.[2]

Considered as a self fulfilling prophecy, Moore’s law has driven silicon valley growth for years. In 1971, the manufacturing process of Intel microprocessors was 10μm. By 2014, it had reduced significantly – to 14nm But according to Michao Kaku, in his book – Physics of the Future; Moore’s law is nearing its end. Limitations in the manufacturing process, due to smallest possible wavelength for Ultraviolet light, used for ‘etching’ components onto a silicon wafer – being 10nm, as well as the problem of quantum leakage – are citied as reasons.

Chip Manufacturers have already started to realize the slowing down of More’s law, and are investing heavily in research geared towards new chip design. As conventional computing reaches its limit, the industry looks forward to innovations such as Quantum Computing, and possibly biological computing – as alternates. We may not be certain which computing paradigm is adopted, but we do know that the transition from conventional computing to a new form of computing shall be, if not the most – one of the most divisive moments of technological history.

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