How to cut down energy loss in power electronics? The right kind of doping Aalto University Share Print E-Mail IMAGE: Sample chamber of the positron accelerator. view more? Credit: Hanna Koikkalainen The trick is to be able to use beryllium atoms in gallium nitride. Gallium nitride is a compound widely used in semiconductors in consumer electronics from LED lights to game consoles. To be useful in devices that need to process considerably more energy than in your everyday home entertainment, though, gallium nitride needs to be manipulated in new ways on the atomic level. "There is growing demand for semiconducting gallium nitride in the power electronics industry. To make electronic devices that can process the amounts of power required in, say, electric cars, we need structures based on large-area semi-insulating semiconductors with properties that allow minimising power loss and can dissipate heat efficiently. To achieve this, adding beryllium into gallium nitride - or 'doping' it - shows great promise," explains Professor Filip Tuomisto from Aalto University. Experiments with beryllium doping were conducted in the late 1990s in the hope that beryllium would prove more efficient as a doping agent than the prevailing magnesium used in LED lights. The work proved unsuccessful, however, and research on beryllium was largely discarded. Working with scientists in Texas and Warsaw, researchers at Aalto University have now managed to show - thanks to advances in computer modelling and experimental techniques - that beryllium can actually perform useful functions in gallium nitride. The article published in Physical Review Letters shows that depending on whether the material is heated or cooled, beryllium atoms will switch positions, changing their nature of either donating or accepting electrons. "Our results provide valuable knowledge for experimental scientists about the fundamentals of how beryllium changes its behaviour during the manufacturing process. During it - while being subjected to high temperatures - the doped compound functions very differently than the end result," describes Tuomisto. If the beryllium-doped gallium nitride structures and their electronic properties can be fully controlled, power electronics could move to a whole new realm of energy efficiency. "The magnitude of the change in energy efficiency could as be similar as when we moved to LED lights from traditional incandescent light bulbs. It could be possible to cut down the global power consumption by up to ten per cent by cutting the energy losses in power distribution systems," says Tuomisto.

Alberta大学的一个工作研究小组发明了一种新型晶体管，可以彻底改变薄膜电子设备。他们的研究成果发表在著名的《自然》科学杂志，可以打开电子设备发展的大门，并将其广泛的应用于医疗成像和可再生资源生产。 团队开发的薄膜晶体管（TFT）的新用途，经常会在低功率、低频设备等中发现，如阅读使用的屏幕。通过研究人员和消费电子行业在改善薄膜晶体管的性能方面有所缓慢，一方面是由于新材料的挑战，一方面是改善传统薄膜晶体管架构的发展缓慢，像金属氧化物半导体场效应晶体管。 该小组已经提交了关于该晶体管的临时专利，Shoute说，下一步的计划是将晶体管应用在这些领域像生物医学成像领域或者可再生能源中。