Useful spin or just spin?

Work at Ohio State University (researchnews.osu.edu/archive/thermospin.htm) with GaMnAs has opened up the possibility of (self) powering electronics from heat by converting the later into electron spin. The team are looking at looking at a hybrid technology thermo-spintronics for siphoning off waste heat to run additional memory or computation. The low temperature growth of GaMnAs is just one of the many areas of MBE reserach that has benefited enormously from the use of the kSA BandiT substrate temperature measurement system www.k-space.com/Products/BandiT.html, which has highlighted important effects completely invisible to other techniques.

But why bother?

A recent paper (arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1009/1009.4698v1.pdf) addresses the issue of an infinitely expanding universe and that in such a scenario even the most unlikely events will eventually occur - and not only occur, but occur an infinite number of times. One solution to this problem, according to Bousso et al, is that time itself will eventually end. Then there would be a finite number of events that occur, with the improbable events occurring less often than the probable events. The physicists have attempted to calculate the probability of when time will end. In two of these scenarios, time has a 50% chance of ending within 3.7 billion years. In two other scenarios, time has a 50% chance of ending within 3.3 billion years.

Humanity is saved

Readers will be immensely relieved to learn (www.theregister.co.uk/2010/08/27/wagner_appeal_fail/) that one Hawaiian resident (Mr Walter Wagner) has failed in his latest (final?) bid to prevent CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) from operating. Whilst not commenting directly on the technical argument (the earth falls into a LHC generated black hole) the justices wrote that speculative fear of future harm does not constitute an injury in fact sufficient to confer standing and the alleged injury, destruction of the earth, is in no way attributable to the US government’s failure to draft an environmental impact statement. Meanwhile the LHC continues to perform (cms.web.cern.ch/cms/News/2010/QCD-10-002/QCD-10-002.pdf).

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Blast from the past

We await further developments but the press statement last month (www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4208647/Plessey-plans-to-run-GaN-SiGe-at-fab) that Plessey Semiconductors Ltd was planning to extend its chip making activities to include both GaN and SiGe is interesting. Whilst originally founded as a mechanical engineering company in 1917, Plessey was well known for truly pioneering semiconductor work including bulk and epitaxial III-V compound semiconductors. Following decades of reorganisation and many changes in ownership, management teams from Plus Semi and the former Plessey site in Roborough joined forces to acquire the Roborough fab (8" and 6" lines) from Xfab on the 1st January 2010. The resulting company was re-named Plessey Semiconductors Ltd.

Wonderfully improbable

Last month the Ig Nobel Prizes for 2010 were awarded (improbable.com/ig/winners/). I share with you my personal two favourites. The Physics Prize: L. Parkin et al, New Zealand Medical Journal. vol. 122, no, 1298, July 3, 2009, pp. 31-8. For demonstrating that, on icy footpaths in wintertime, people slip and fall less often if they wear socks on the outside of their shoes. The Management Prize: A. Pluchino et al, Physica A, vol. 389, no. 3, February 2010, pp. 467-72. For demonstrating mathematically that organizations would become more efficient if they promoted people at random.

IQE's hole in one?

Golf (the Ryder Cup) and rain may have been the biggest events in south Wales last weekend and Monday but Cardiff based materials suppler IQE plc (www.iqep.com/news-2010/sep_30_10.asp) have also hit the headlines by their acquisition of Galaxy Compound Semiconductors, Inc. (www.galaxywafer.com) and their intention to raise over £20 million to fund this together with capacity expansion, debt repayments and strengthening of their balance sheet. IQE will pay a cash sum for Galaxy of up to 5.5 times their 2010 EBITDA, a total consideration estimated to be between $5.5m and $14.15m. 65 million shares will be placed to fund the acquisition and the other activities. Based in Spokane WA, USA, Galaxy is the world’s leading InSb and GaSb substrate supplier. Founded in 1999, the company was originally a spin off from Johnson-Matthey and for those with long memories their crystal growth dates back to the mid 1960s with Cominco Electronic Materials. The purchase of Galaxy positions IQE as a global leader in the rapidly growing market for antimony based infrared materials. It provides IQE with new manufacturing capacity, new products and new clients. The acquisition certainly looks far more like an Eagle or an Albatross than a Bogey.

Thought for the month

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled" - Richard Feynman, US Physicist (1918 -88)

But why bother?

A recent paper (arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1009/1009.4698v1.pdf) addresses the issue of an infinitely expanding universe and that in such a scenario even the most unlikely events will eventually occur - and not only occur, but occur an infinite number of times. One solution to this problem, according to Bousso et al, is that time itself will eventually end. Then there would be a finite number of events that occur, with the improbable events occurring less often than the probable events. The physicists have attempted to calculate the probability of when time will end. In two of these scenarios, time has a 50% chance of ending within 3.7 billion years. In two other scenarios, time has a 50% chance of ending within 3.3 billion years.

Humanity is saved

Readers will be immensely relieved to learn (www.theregister.co.uk/2010/08/27/wagner_appeal_fail/) that one Hawaiian resident (Mr Walter Wagner) has failed in his latest (final?) bid to prevent CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) from operating. Whilst not commenting directly on the technical argument (the earth falls into a LHC generated black hole) the justices wrote that speculative fear of future harm does not constitute an injury in fact sufficient to confer standing and the alleged injury, destruction of the earth, is in no way attributable to the US government’s failure to draft an environmental impact statement. Meanwhile the LHC continues to perform (cms.web.cern.ch/cms/News/2010/QCD-10-002/QCD-10-002.pdf).