Implementation of Plasmonics in VLSI

This Paper presents the idea of Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) using Plasmonic Waveguides. Current VLSI techniques are facing challenges with respect to clock frequencies which tend to scale up, making it more difficult for the designers to distribute and maintain low clock skew between these high frequency clocks across the entire chip. Surface Plasmons are light waves that occur at a metal/dielectric interface, where a group of electrons is collectively moving back and forth. These waves are trapped near the surface as they interact with the plasma of electrons near the surface of the metal. The decay length of SPs into the metal is two orders of magnitude smaller than the wavelength of the light in air. This feature of SPs provides the possibility of localization and the guiding of light in sub wavelength metallic structures, and it can be used to construct miniaturized optoelectronic circuits with sub wavelength components. In this paper, various methods of doing the same have been discussed some of which include DLSPPW’s, Plasmon waveguides by self-assembly, Silicon-based plasmonic waveguides etc. Hence by using Plasmonic chips, the speed, size and efficiency of microprocessor chips can be revolutionized thus bringing a whole new dimension to VLSI design.