Maximizing Volatility in Magnetic Tunnel Junctions
April 29, 2021•
Physics 14, s51
A device usually associated with stable information storage can be modified to be extremely sensitive to thermal noise, offering a source of randomness for probabilistic computing.
K. Y. Camsari
K. Y. Camsari
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Kerem Camsari at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and colleagues might have devised the worst possible computer-memory device. Their array of electronic structures called magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) have magnetic states that are so volatile that thermal noise causes the states to constantly change, making the MTJs incapable of retaining information [1]. But the device is far from useless. The researchers hope that its fluctuating electrical signals could be a valuable resource for probabilistic computing.