Research: Rensselaer Student Invents Alternative to Silicon Chip

Commencement 2008: Rensselaer Student Invents Alternative to Silicon Chip
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (05/13/08) DeMarco, Gabrielle

Recent Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute doctoral graduate Weixiao Huang has invented a new gallium nitride (GaN) transistor that could reduce power consumption and improve the efficiency of power electronics systems. "Silicon has been the workhorse in the semiconductor industry for last two decades," Huang says. "But as power electronics get more sophisticated and require higher performing transistors, engineers have been seeking an alternative like gallium nitride-based transistors that can perform better than silicon and in extreme conditions." Engineers have known that GaN and other gallium-based materials have electrical properties that are superior to silicon, but no useful GaN metal/oxide semiconductor (MOS) transistors had been developed. Huang's transistor, the world's first GaN MOS field-effect transistor (MOSFET), has already demonstrated world-record performance, Huang says. "If these new GaN transistors replaced many existing silicon MOSFETs in power electronics systems, there would be global reduction in fossil fuel consumption and pollution," Huang says.
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