Ministry of Science & Technology informed on 25 January 2023 that Scientists at Bengaluru’s Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR) have used scandium nitride (ScN) to develop brain-like computing. ScN is a semiconducting material that is stable and CMOS compatible.
The invention has the potential to be translated into an industrial product, providing a new material for stable, CMOS-compatible optoelectronic synaptic functionalities at a relatively lower energy cost.
The team used ScN to develop an artificial optoelectronic synapse with ScN thin films that can mimic synaptic functionalities like short-term memory, long-term memory, learning-forgetting, frequency selective optical filtering, frequency-dependent potentiation and depression, Hebbian learning, and logic-gate operations. With varying magnesium (Mg) dopant concentrations, both excitatory and inhibitory operations can be achieved in the same material.
Q.: What is the main material used in the development of brain-like computing by scientists at JNCASR?
a) Scandium Nitride (ScN)
b) Silicon (Si)
c) Gallium Nitride (GaN)
d) Germanium (Ge)
Answer: a) Scandium Nitride (ScN)
