Microelectronics Beyond Moore’s Law

As we reach the limits of Moore’s Law using silicon chips, the challenges of energy demand, global supply, and climate change demand a new approach. We’re partnering with industry, universities, and national labs to develop new materials and techniques for smaller, faster, and more energy-efficient microelectronics.

John Shalf, a short-haired person wearing a white collared shirt, speaking at an event.

Devices and complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology

Exploring, identifying, modeling, and demonstrating new materials and devices to achieve ultra-efficient computing and increased performance.

Advanced manufacturing and integration

Leveraging our expertise in extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography and materials to develop novel nanomanufacturing methods to increase chip density.

Architecture

Applying our expertise in advanced computing to exploit new devices, materials systems, and packaging technologies developed in the first two thrusts.

Programming models

Creating new paradigms integrated with the new systems that define how application designers interact with the machine.

Quantum materials research and discovery

Developing and understanding new synthetic materials and their electronic, spin, chemical, and physical properties.

Center for X-ray Optics (CXRO)

Two researchers in clean suits stand on opposite ends of a large machine.

Developing EUV systems to address national needs in health, the environment, and semiconductor manufacturing.

Center for High Precision Patterning Science (CHiPPS)

Pink, green, and blue square patterns. Each square is a chip with microscopic transistors and circuits.

Creating a fundamental understanding and control of patterning processes for advanced manufacturing of future-generation microelectronics.

Co-design of Ultra-Low-Voltage Beyond CMOS Microelectronics

Small orange and blue lights repeated in a wave pattern.

Exploring new physics leading to higher energy efficiency in computing.

Co-design and Integration of Nano-sensors on CMOS

Orange and gold microchip artistic rendering.

Developing nano-material layers to add new capabilities to CMOS chips.

Microscopic and Electronic STRucture Observatory (MAESTRO) beamline

Dedicated to determining the electronic structure of materials at the mesoscopic (10–100 nm) scale.

Quantum Materials Program

Artistic rendering of a light nearing an electric material.

Investigating how next-gen electronic materials respond to pulses of intense light.

Electronic Materials Program

Developing semiconductors of novel composition and morphology for energy applications.

Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (iARPA) AGILE

Reinventing computer architecture to efficiently handle complex, dynamic data, enabling better analysis and predictions from massive datasets and unlocking new levels of computing performance.

PARADISE++

Artistic figure of dots and colorful lines on top of a dark background.

Building a large-scale HPC framework to simulate post-Moore architectures built using emerging technologies.

Adaptive mesh Refinement Time-domain ElectrodynaMics Solver (ARTEMIS)

Gloved hands holding a square microchip.

A full physical electromagnetic simulation framework for modeling next-generation microelectronics.

Advanced technologies research at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)

Perlmutter super computer at Berkeley Lab.

Enabling and supporting the development of next-generation HPC platforms and applications.

The Materials Project

Accelerating innovation in materials research for batteries, solar cells, and computer chips.

We foster strong partnerships that guide innovations from the Lab toward the marketplace. See our microelectronics technologies.

"The mission of the CHiPPS center is to create new fundamental understanding and control of patterning materials and processes with atomic precision. The goal is to enable the large-scale manufacturing of next-generation microelectronics."

Archana Raja, a person with long dark hair wearing a red patterned shirt.

"Our work shows that we need to go beyond the analogy of Lego blocks to understand devices made from stacks of disparate atomically-thin, two-dimensional materials. The seemingly distinct layers communicate through shared electronic pathways, allowing us to access and eventually design functionalities that are greater than the sum of the parts."

Jie Yao, a person with short dark hair and glasses wearing a light blue collared shirt.

"We are interested in the topology of various photonic systems. We developed one of the first models that allow the understanding of the twist degree of freedom in moiré photonic structures and the prediction of novel optical properties in such systems."

An illustration showing a layer of closely packed spheres, mostly gray, with a few blue and red ones mixed in. Floating above the layer are several small clusters of spheres in different arrangements of the blue, red, and gray.

Inside the microchips powering your devices, the atoms have a hidden order all their own. Berkeley Lab scientists have confirmed that elements in semiconductors have preferred arrangements that impact the material’s properties, opening the door for new fabrication methods and unique technologies.

Bruno La Fontaine, director of the Center for X-Ray Optics and microelectronics expert, shares how advanced X-ray tools developed at the Lab are enabling breakthroughs in EUV lithography — an essential technology for printing smaller, faster, and more energy-efficient microchips. Learn how fundamental science at Berkeley Lab is shaping the future of devices we all rely on, from smartphones to the AI systems of tomorrow.

In this 7-minute audio interview, listen as Bruno La Fontaine, director of the Center for X-Ray Optics (CXRO), discusses how scientists at CXRO and the Advanced Light Source helped pioneer a revolutionary approach to making microchips called extreme ultraviolet lithography.