Memristor:
Researchers from the University of Cambridge have reported a new kind of brain-inspired nanodevice, a hafnium-oxide memristor that could dramatically cut artificial intelligence’s (AI) energy use.
- Memristor’ is a combination of ‘memory’ and ‘resistor’.
- It is an electronic component whose resistance depends on the history of current flow, allowing it to “remember” past electrical states.
- A resistor is a small device that applies a fixed amount of resistance to a current passed through it.
- Unlike a resistor, a memristor has variable resistance and ‘remembers’ the resistance.
- When the current is removed, the memristor ‘remembers’ the resistance it offered and maintains it.
- Memristors are nanomaterial and don’t take up much space. Their energy demand is also very small.
- They are usually made of a thin layer of titanium dioxide (TiO2) sandwiched between two metal electrodes.
- Applications of Memristor
- Memory Devices: Due to their ability to store previous resistive states, memristors are viable non-volatile random-access memories (NVRAM) for computers, industrial automation systems.
- Integrated Circuits: Memristors have been identified as viable components for augmenting or potentially replacing transistors in integrated circuits (ICs).
- Neuromorphic Computing: Researchers are exploring the viability of using memristors to build neuromorphic (brain-like) systems for artificial intelligence.
