For comparison, that is roughly the operational power of the brain of a lizard, or a dinosaur. By various estimates, that is the operational power of the human brain. In other words, in the next twenty years, the growth in computing power should correspond to hundreds of millions of years of human evolution. These computers of the future will not think as humans do, but the progress will be staggering nonetheless. The question this issue of the Journal addresses is whether such advances will continue.
Technologists see many of the substantial barriers to further advancement.
In silicon technology, CMOS scaling appears to be approaching an end, while rapid progress in optical lithography seems to be nearly impossible. It is difficult to imagine how we can make the needed insulating layers thin and perfect enough to fabricate the transistor gates of the future, or control the statistical fluctuations in doping materials. In magnetic storage the superparamagnetic limit seems to be not far away, and recording head scaling a growing problem. Nonetheless, history has shown that we have always found new ways to extend existing technologies or develop new ones to go beyond those which are reaching their limits. The papers in this issue describe both the evolving technologies and the breakthroughs that may fuel the information age of the future.