Interconnects for nanoelectronics

In the nanoelectronics era with ever smaller devices and higher densities, there are challenges of signal transmission and information communications via interconnects. We examine the interconnect issues for both charge-based and spin-based information systems. For charge-based systems, since there are substantial activities in optical interconnect, this paper focuses on other concepts and approaches. Self-assembled molecular wires, carbon nanotubes/nanowires and virus engineered metallic wires can be used for interconnects. The use of new nano-architectures such as cellular automata, which use mostly nearest neighbors, make the use of self-assembled interconnects even more attractive. These techniques may be applied readily to molecular devices. Spin-based devices offer a new opportunity for low power, high functional throughput applications. We analyze the use of spin waves for information transmission buses referred to as spin wave bus. By introducing these novel circuits built on the spin-based devices and spin wave interconnect, we anticipate enhanced logic functionality. The challenges and issues are discussed.