Scientist make transistor from just seven atoms

The ultimate goal is to create a transistor composed of a single atom. That’s been achieved in the lab, but so-called quantum computers are probably decades away from reality.

The Aussie transistor isn’t anywhere near ready for commercialization yet, either — the demo application was crafted by hand using an electron microscope to gently move the phosphorus atoms from which it was constructed onto a silicon surface — but it has strong potential if a mass-production scheme can be worked out. A chip created entirely from such miniature components could conceivably be 100 times as powerful as today’s microchips.