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The semiconductor switch,
because it can be manufactured at very small scales, has become
the fundamental device in all of modern electronics. The Pentium
microchip, for example, contains 3.6 million such switching
devices, which together perform the enormously complex functions
available in the Pentium processor
California Molecular Electronics' (CALMEC®)
ChiropticeneTM
Switch
is a device
that goes beyond the semiconductor switch in size reduction and
cost. This switch is a single molecule that exhibits classical
switching properties. Being only a molecule in size, it is
hundreds of times smaller than even the smallest semiconductor
switch.
Chiropticene molecules are
switchable between two distinct states which are spatial mirror
images of each other. These mirror images are electronically and
optically distinct enabling sharp and stable switching
properties. Mirror imagery is a property familiar to everyone
because the human hands are mirror images of each other (i.e.,
the left hand seen in a mirror, looks just like the right hand
seen straight on without a mirror).
Despite the fact that the two hands are alike,
they are also distinct. A glove that fits the right hand doesn't
fit the left, and vice versa. Being distinct but equal, the
hands form a natural binary pair just as do a (1) and a (0). By
using left- and righthanded signals, we can create a binary
'digital' code. Mirror image properties are also called
"handedness" properties because of this relationship between the
left and right hands. In chemistry, such properties are called "chiral"
(pronounced kyral) properties after the Greek work Cheir,
"hand". The Chiropticenes get their name from a combination of
the word chiral, because they exhibit handedness, and the word
optic, because they are optically switchable and optically
readable.
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