N1005 IBM Research

Farming at nanoscale dimensions

<div class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Why understanding how nanowires self-assemble could lead to a new crop of nanodevices</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">by Dr. Frances Ross, materials scientist at IBM Research</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKaQNqJ-0L_Z3hyXQVtipDs4_0skmUZxEGeW3g1ombIez0m4FcoAXff6Hf4KKCtViBzV0n3HhMpY4gHpYBoe2kixcZ13FXY2o2HiIJP4ixKOUpNh5jXboFERkYFS_Ch_xpx-sowQkl6b0/s1600/Panciera-CoverImage1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKaQNqJ-0L_Z3hyXQVtipDs4_0skmUZxEGeW3g1ombIez0m4FcoAXff6Hf4KKCtViBzV0n3HhMpY4gHpYBoe2kixcZ13FXY2o2HiIJP4ixKOUpNh5jXboFERkYFS_Ch_xpx-sowQkl6b0/s400/Panciera-CoverImage1.jpg" width="303" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Artistic rendering of self-assembled nanowires<br />composed of different crystal structures<br />that spontaneously grow with the help of a<br />catalytic nanoparticle at the tip of each nanowire.<br />(credit: <a href="http://aidansugano.com/">Aidan Sugano</a>.)</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Building transistors today is done with lithography, which is a “top-down” process that uses patterning to create the complex layers that make up the transistor structure. It’s a bit like exposing a negative on photographic paper to get the pattern you want and then using this pattern as a template to place each material – metal, insulator or semiconductor – in exactly the right location. This process has worked successfully since the 1950s, and our scientists have even demonstrated the </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">first working test chips with features approaching </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"><a href="http://asmarterplanet.com/blog/2015/07/a-new-wave-innovation-chips.html"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">7 nanometers</span></a></span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">, the equivalent of placing more than 20 billion tiny switches on chips the size of a fingernail</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">. But as we get to ever-smaller dimensions, new approaches to building nanoscale devices will be required.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">At IBM’s T. J. Watson Research Center we use a technique called </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"><a href="http://ibmresearchnews.blogspot.com/2015/07/self-assembling-nano-whiskers.html"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">self-assembly</span></a></span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> to grow and directly control nanostructures that could one day form parts of integrated circuits. Self-assembly looks at chip building from the other end of the spectrum: a “bottom-up” approach that builds nanostructures in a way that is dictated by physics rather than by an imposed pattern. In some ways it’s like farming, in that that you plant seeds to grow a crop, and then support the growth with the right conditions to get the result you want.</span><br /><a name="more"></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">But exploring self-assembly doesn’t mean we are ready to throw away today’s approach; instead, we want to use top-down strategies that we have already learned over many years, and combine them with new tricks that use self-assembly.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Think of water splashing onto a pane of glass. It spontaneously forms little hemispheres. The droplets are hemispherical because </span><span class="renderedqtext"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">surface tension pulls the water molecules into this shape to minimize the surface area and energy of each droplet. But there is no reason for the droplets to form in any particular location or to be any particular size, so their positions and sizes are random. The spontaneous formation of the hemispherical shape is an example of self-assembly, but other aspects of the process (position, size) are not controlled.</span></span><br /><br /><span class="renderedqtext"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Now imagine there is a scratch on the glass. Water droplets form on the scratch, because it is a good, low energy place for the water molecules to stick. We have now </span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">combined self-assembly – “make a hemispherical droplet on this surface” – with an imposed pattern – “make a droplet <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">on this part of the surface </i>by using carefully placed scratches.” The result is that we can build more complicated patterns. Flexible, customized patterns like this water example, but on the nanoscale, help us build integrated circuits.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">The more precisely we can direct this self-assembly, the more versatility we can achieve. We can choose different materials for our nanostructures, build them with different sizes, and control their chemical compositions in ways that allow them to be tuned to have the properties we need. The properties of some nanomaterials could include the ability to do the job of a transistor but with less power, or at extreme temperatures beyond what silicon can handle.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">How to direct a nanowire</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br /></div><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">In order to direct self-assembly, we have to understand the physical stimuli that influence atoms to assemble in a certain way as they form a nanostructure. The particular nanostructures we find most interesting are called nanowires. </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">These are long thin crystals whose amazing <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">length-to-width ratio</span> could help create very densely packed transistors.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> Using a combination of imposed patterning and self-assembly, we can grow nanowires spontaneously using the help of catalytic particles. And we can watch the nanowires as they grow, recording the process on video using a one-of-a-kind Ultra High Vacuum Transmission Electron Microscope in our lab.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">We load a flat substrate into the microscope, place catalytic particles onto it (this is the directed part of the process), then heat it and add some reactive gases. We watch what happens to the catalytic particles (this is the self-assembly part of the process) by magnifying the </span><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">image by 50,000 times or more. The reaction can be slow – it takes hours for the whole experiment to be finished – but the videos show how the nanostructures grow, one layer of atoms after another. </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Recording videos, for example at different temperatures or with different added gases, is central to understanding every step of the nanowires’ growth. We get to see cause and effect when the conditions change, so we can work out the laws of physics that control the growth.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span><br /><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/toKPzF-QnkE" width="420"></iframe></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>This video was recorded in an ultra high vacuum transmission electron microscope</i><br /><i>showing a silicon nanowire growing from a gold-based catalyst. The silicon is the vertical post and the catalyst is the liquid droplet on the tip. The diameter of the nanowire is 70 nanometers; in other words, about 1/1,000th of the diameter of a human hair. The stripes in the silicon and the zigzag shape along its edge provide information about the atomic arrangement within the nanowire.<br />This movie was recorded at 500 degrees C and is sped up by 30 times.</i> </div><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Recently, we have become especially interested in growing nanowires made of gallium arsenide that form with the help of catalysts made of gold nanoparticles. For this we need two reactive gases, trimethylgallium and arsine. We chose these because they supply the two components needed to build the nanowire, gallium and arsenic. When we record our movies, the first reaction we see is between gallium and gold. This reaction turns the original gold nanoparticles into hemispherical liquid gold-gallium droplets. As we continue to watch, gallium and arsenic combine within each droplet to start growing a gallium arsenide nanowire beneath the droplet. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Gallium arsenide nanowires grown this way are particularly special because it is possible to change the way the gallium and arsenic atoms stack up within each nanowire. Two arrangements of the atoms are possible, and we can change from one to the other simply by altering the temperature of the reaction or even just varying the ratio of the two gases as they flow past the catalysts. The videos show how these changes in growth conditions modify the way the atoms arrange themselves at the junction between the nanowire and the catalyst. And that causes a change in how the atoms eventually stack up when they form the nanowire. We still have the same material, gallium arsenide, but the two possible arrangements of the atoms lead to different electrical properties for the whole nanowire. </span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Understanding what drives atoms to take up one arrangement versus another gives us a better chance of growing nanowires that have the particular electrical properties that are needed for a device </span><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">such as a nano-transistor</span><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">. It’s akin to having more colors on your palette so that you can paint a better picture. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">These special nanowires, composed of regions with different atomic arrangement, have applications in photonics or single electron transistors, both important building blocks for electronic circuits. And simply knowing that we can control the crystal arrangement in a nanowire will open up the microprocessor community’s imagination for new devices. In particular, optoelectronics, where light and electricity are combined in photonics structures, is a good bet. But that’s just the “tip of the crystal.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">O</span>ur latest results, "Interface dynamics and crystal phase switching in Gallium Arsenide nanowires", will be published <span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">in </span>this week’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Nature.</i></span></div>

Why understanding how nanowires self-assemble could lead to a new crop of nanodevices by Dr. Frances Ross, materials scientist at IBM Resear...

Delivering financial services via blockchain

6:04 AM N1000 0

<br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;"></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmsJBS4N40sZKVAlRwmHkaawmslOpv_VsUIa6usmbNbcubFNAm9FML8QfUNCMDClCGRZiI-InOOZyXyhe9tNKNQlv1kJ7i3LmLfbBEfW4WwM5ULO32ETarTMJP_G-EuXqv94hdFUMHiTz0/s1600/rgopinath.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmsJBS4N40sZKVAlRwmHkaawmslOpv_VsUIa6usmbNbcubFNAm9FML8QfUNCMDClCGRZiI-InOOZyXyhe9tNKNQlv1kJ7i3LmLfbBEfW4WwM5ULO32ETarTMJP_G-EuXqv94hdFUMHiTz0/s200/rgopinath.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Editor’s note: This article is by Ramesh Gopinath, vice president of Blockchain, IBM Research</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Have you recently bought a house, or sold shares in a company, or maybe sent money overseas? If so, I suspect that the experience has left you wondering why these simple transactions take so much time and cost so much money. In each case, what looks like a simple financial transaction takes place over many days via a complex web of interactions between many parties. For example, let’s say that I want to send some money to my mom in India. The way it works today, the money passes through several overseas banks, linked together by so-called “correspondence banking” arrangements, before it shows up in her account. This process takes days, with fees pile up along the way. Such circuitous, expensive and often risky financial transactions are what my team at IBM Research, and our partners at the Linux Foundation want to flip on its head with <a href="http://www.ibm.com/blogs/think/2016/03/16/how-businesses-and-governments-can-capitalize-on-blockchain/" target="_blank">blockchain</a><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">.</span></span><br /><a name="more"></a><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Blockchain is an emerging platform for transaction services that will fundamentally change the way we do business in many industries. <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Blockchain</span> technology has the potential to radically transform multi-party business networks, enabling significantly <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">faster, less expensive,</span> <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">lower risk</span> transactions and <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">innovative new business models. </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Blockchain is an append-only, shared ledger of digitally signed and encrypted transactions that is replicated across a peer network of nodes. Cryptography is used to ensure that participants have visibility only into information in the ledger that they are authorized to see. The copies of the ledger across the peer nodes are kept in sync by running a coordination protocol called the “consensus” algorithm. Transactions once committed onto the ledger can never be changed since no node can unilaterally change its copy of the ledger; i.e., participants cannot rewrite history or deny past transactions. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Going back to my earlier money transfer example, if both my bank and my mother’s bank kept their accounts on the blockchain, then one could have an instantaneous, low-cost transaction that just involves the two banks and yet is invisible to all other participants who have access to the blockchain<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">.</span></span><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/F0P7NM7d-ps/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/F0P7NM7d-ps?feature=player_embedded" width="560"></iframe></div><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Another interesting capability of the blockchain is that you can attach business logic to the transactions. This so-called “smart contracts” capability allows one to model and automate business processes. To see how this can be useful let’s take an example of international trade: a US retailer wants to buy a Chinese toy manufacturer’s teddy bears. The latter wants to get paid before shipping the teddy bears. The former wants to pay after inspecting the received teddy bears. Today, banks step in as trust intermediaries to close this gap. Banks vouch for the retailer by extending a line of credit – a letter-of-credit – based on which the manufacturer ships the goods, and the payment happens when the goods are received. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The entire end-to-end trade process involves many participants: the exporter, the importer, the exporter’s bank, the importer’s bank, shipping companies, and customs officials, as well as complex, often manual interactions involving many documents, making everything expensive and time consuming. With blockchain, the business logic of the process can be coded as a smart contract and executed automatically, leading to reduced cost, increased speed and reduced risk in international trade. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">44,000 lines of code and counting</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-line-height-alt: 11.5pt; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-line-height-alt: 11.5pt; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Much has been made of the 44,000 lines of code IBM has put toward the Linux Foundation’s <a href="http://www.ibm.com/blogs/think/2016/02/16/reinventing-securities-trading-with-blockchain/">Hyperledger Project</a>. My team has been developing several key algorithms, with many more on its way, for this project. For example, we have developed a new consensus algorithm, called Sieve, tailored to specific blockchain use cases. Cryptographers at our labs in Almaden and Zurich have implemented an identity management service built with the latest in cryptography. A key capability of this service is user transactional privacy (anonymity and unlinkability of transactions). We have also implemented </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">fine-grained privacy and confidentiality control that allows authors of smart contracts to precisely specify both who can view them and who can execute them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-line-height-alt: 11.5pt; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Let’s go back to those teddy bears. Using a blockchain, the manufacturer and retailer may only know that money and goods exchanged – but otherwise they only see digital signatures that customs and shipping met their agreements. Likewise, customs and shipping may not know how much the entire transaction cost. More importantly, none of the competitors of the manufacturer can infer from the blockchain about this trade. These “smart” contracts sit on the blockchain, with each participant only seeing and signing the part that pertains to their role.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">New services, new roles with blockchain</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Blockchain technology is viewed by many businesses as both a threat and an opportunity. Without a doubt, blockchain will disintermediate some roles in the financial services sector. For example, the days of overseas payments going through long chains of intermediaries are nearly over. At the same time there is a huge opportunity to reimagine businesses using the shared ledger and smart contract capabilities of the blockchain, leading to new services. Back to the international trade example: once the state of the trade is captured on the blockchain, it opens up a whole world of new possibilities. IoT-enabled events could trigger fractional payments depending on the location of the goods in transit. For instance, when the teddy bears are half way to their destination, 50 percent of the payment is made.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">And as I mentioned, the immense data from ledgers that can’t change or be deleted is a great source of opportunity to apply cognitive computing. I’m looking forward to the new roles that could emerge. One thing is for certain, whether sending money to a relative in another country, or moving goods internationally, blockchain will make things faster, cheaper and more transparent – which is a good thing. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;">IBM Research is hosting a blockchain workshop in Chicago. If you’d like to learn more </span></i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://www.zurich.ibm.com/dccl/"><i>visit this Web site.</i></a><span class="MsoHyperlink"></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div>

blockchain finance security Delivering financial services via blockchain

Editor’s note: This article is by Ramesh Gopinath, vice president of Blockchain, IBM Research Have you recently bought a house, or sold shar...

IBM and Next Einstein Forum launch visiting scientist program

1:21 PM N1000 0

<br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">IBM Research-Africa and the Next Einstein Forum have partnered on a new <a href="http://nef.org/next-einstein-forum-and-ibm-research-launch-visiting-scientist-program/" target="_blank">Visiting Scientist Program</a>, where five of the <a href="http://mgafrica.com/article/2016-03-04-africas-best-young-scientists" target="_blank">15 newly named NEF Fellows</a> will have the opportunity to visit and lecture at one of IBM’s 12 global research labs.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“The visiting scientists – full-time scientists at prestigious institutions and universities across the world – will spend a week at the IBM Research lab where they can directly engaging with our scientists who work in their related field of study,” said Solomon Assefa, the director of IBM Research-Africa’s lab in South Africa, at the NEF’s 2016 Global Gathering in Senegal.</span><br /><a name="more"></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">During their fellowship, each will have the opportunity to lecture to the IBM scientific community, collaborate and network with IBMers, work with local lab directors, and explore the potential for future collaboration between their institutions and IBM Research.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The NEF is an initiative of the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, and seeks to mobilize the brightest minds in Africa to address the continent’s most pressing issues, with an emphasis on the STEM disciplines and the social sciences. The foundation showcases the brilliant contributions of Africa’s young scientific community through its Fellows, all of whom are under the age of 42. The Fellows hail from across the continent, and are making enormous impacts in diverse fields at world-leading institutions, including Harvard University, Max Planck Institute, University of Cape Town, and IBM Research – Africa.</span><br /><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjArUL_gz_pwOloY1DLbLBGrp7hNMBYOSW1BuO0VFPnrqCAj3pvc6-xOWG69GgkKJbuPPcPVCynWtuBYDl44D69eRIm4ccHZH5fbkjkSMirL911E3gdC8xIh4ZDWuTO3UZlwkerAU67W-rA/s1600/IBM_kweldemariam_NEF_Fellow.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjArUL_gz_pwOloY1DLbLBGrp7hNMBYOSW1BuO0VFPnrqCAj3pvc6-xOWG69GgkKJbuPPcPVCynWtuBYDl44D69eRIm4ccHZH5fbkjkSMirL911E3gdC8xIh4ZDWuTO3UZlwkerAU67W-rA/s320/IBM_kweldemariam_NEF_Fellow.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">IBM Research-Africa's Kommy Weldemariam<br />named a Next Einstein Forum Fellow</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Forum tells their stories, highlighting the innovation and scientific advancement they’ve made across the continent, while also working to build an African scientific identity. IBM’s <a href="http://nef.org/nef-fellows/komminist-weldermariam/" target="_blank">Kommy Weldemariam</a>was recognized as a Fellow in 2015 for his work creating cognitive systems for education and healthcare in Kenya, and across the continent.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“What we are doing here is trying to reverse the classic technology transfer where Africa inherits innovation from the West,” Kommy told <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/ibm/2015/10/29/how-african-schools-are-using-cognitive-systems-to-help-shape-the-future-of-education/#9d5bae54cf4a" target="_blank"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Forbes</i></a>, last year.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;"></span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">In addition to bringing together Africa’s top scientists, policymakers, industry leaders, civil representatives, and entrepreneurs, the NEF also hosts the online NEF Platform. It serves as a hub for information on science and innovation policy in Africa, and facilitates information sharing among scientific leaders and young innovators about the transformative potential of science. The Foundation is working to change the narrative of science on the African continent from a landscape fraught with challenges to one loaded with potential.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Each NEF Fellowship is for a period of two years. The Fellows will have the opportunity to submit an application to IBM’s Visiting Scientist Program in the first six months of the Fellowship – the first of whom will begin the program this September.</span><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5G21oPCF71zuBDx56SSUl00JSUJ0pGWwRcsaHYWMziot8wsRG88rtuVQHtX20RA3yR-JAZkLYpcTUUhkM5QhXl2_RunCK4WX2wLjQd7eU3oikYK8kgza2SmnmTaKZzvh_NplV1Qzv84iX/s1600/NEF_fellows_class.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5G21oPCF71zuBDx56SSUl00JSUJ0pGWwRcsaHYWMziot8wsRG88rtuVQHtX20RA3yR-JAZkLYpcTUUhkM5QhXl2_RunCK4WX2wLjQd7eU3oikYK8kgza2SmnmTaKZzvh_NplV1Qzv84iX/s400/NEF_fellows_class.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Next Einstein Forum's latest Fellows class.</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 115%;"></span>

Africa education South Africa IBM and Next Einstein Forum launch visiting scientist program

IBM Research-Africa and the Next Einstein Forum have partnered on a new Visiting Scientist Program , where five of the 15 newly named NEF Fe...

IBM Scientists Bring Trust and Reliability to the Cloud with AdvancedCryptography in EU Project

3:40 AM N1000 0

<br /><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Editor's note: this interview is by <a href="https://ch.linkedin.com/in/katherina-elefheriou-a452a3117/en" target="_blank">Katherina Eleftheriou</a>, IBM Research-Zurich media relations.</span></i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"> </span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Connected</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;"> </span>“things”</span> <span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">– everything from hospital beds, train tracks, cars, buildings and more – are generating massive amounts of data that can be analyzed to provide quick, actionable insights. But before this can happen, the data needs to be collected in the cloud where advanced algorithms can detect patterns to predict, for example, when the hospital bed will be available or when the train tracks will require repairs. </span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlDaOJZ2FFh3T7-DTecVLDl42inlTdVtH_XIV5HX7YtIZuKeA0132YbFsMSZtH305sddwDrj7lj2B7Y3UyOv2QCpzPv0ahtbL7Uam_9NSXLVFENCpK0Wpe5E5DGrajiOi3tLVrTv9r6BU/s1600/UasZXQii.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlDaOJZ2FFh3T7-DTecVLDl42inlTdVtH_XIV5HX7YtIZuKeA0132YbFsMSZtH305sddwDrj7lj2B7Y3UyOv2QCpzPv0ahtbL7Uam_9NSXLVFENCpK0Wpe5E5DGrajiOi3tLVrTv9r6BU/s200/UasZXQii.png" width="200" /></a></div><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The security of this data is of the utmost importance, which is why many organizations are so focused on building trust and security into the cloud. </span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Last June, the European Union’s <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/">Horizon2020</a> program granted </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span class="_Tgc">€</span>6.4M euros to a consortium called <a href="http://www.tredisec.eu/">TREDISEC</a>to improve cryptographic protocols and system security mechanisms for the cloud.<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;"> </span>IBM’s <span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">r</span>esearch lab in Zurich is one of the TREDISEC partners. I recently sat down with several of the scientists on the project, including <a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-aso">Alessandro Sorniotti</a>, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/angelo-de-caro-7954625">Angelo De Caro</a>, <a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-KUR">Anil Kurmus</a>and <a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-EUG">Matthias Neugschwandtner</a>, to discuss the upcoming challenges of this ambitious open source project and it’s impact on security and efficiency in tomorrow’s cloud.</span><br /><a name="more"></a></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="more"></a></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Q. Please give us an overview of the project.</span></b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Alessandro Sorniotti (AS): <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The scope of the project is security in cloud, with a focus on outsourcing. We are taking a holistic approach, which we hope will allow us to study the problem in its entirety and discover security gaps that are currently hidden. </span></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">For example, if you take a single problem like “I don’t trust the cloud provider, therefore I need to encrypt my data” or “I would like to use the storage system as efficiently as possible, so I will compress and deduplicate data and I do it with the best and fastest algorithms.” Both of these singular problems are solvable and have been solved. But if you combine them together, the problem becomes exponentially more difficult because it becomes the proverbial blanket that doesn’t cover everything.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">When we wrote the proposal, we tried to be bold and consider all of the aspects<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">:</span> to build a system that needs to be used by multiple users who do not trust one another<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">;</span> to allow for data outsourcing<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">;</span>and be encrypted to use the storage system in an efficient way. </span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWJoDFbyda0sp4ab4hhi9z38E4ijALvgcjEyeOYaTXO7BZpYZ1nMo4y9AQVDcLvKy1I_u4NH3iK49j0tSiffNoDhEpICKQf5zCXDIPlOdhqB8jIgX8KMyzUeSt5oEiaoRDVvkEpart31M/s1600/10992881175_75ba873d1d_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWJoDFbyda0sp4ab4hhi9z38E4ijALvgcjEyeOYaTXO7BZpYZ1nMo4y9AQVDcLvKy1I_u4NH3iK49j0tSiffNoDhEpICKQf5zCXDIPlOdhqB8jIgX8KMyzUeSt5oEiaoRDVvkEpart31M/s320/10992881175_75ba873d1d_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sorniotti keeps clouds secure.</td></tr></tbody></table><b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Q. How hard is it to prevent users from tapping into someone else’s data?</span></b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Anil Kurmus (AK): <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It depends on the security model, and it depends on the degree of access you give the users. </span></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">If the interface with the server is rather restrictive, maintaining control is fairly easy. But if you want to give a wider degree of access, for example, access to the bare metal server like IBM Softlayer offers, where you outsource not only storage but also computation, the problem becomes harder. It’s like giving the keys of your house to a curious stranger and then trusting them to stay in the kitchen all day.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Q. What is the aim of this project consider<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">ing</span> it’s a European open-source project?</span></b></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">AK: <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">We want to develop the mechanisms and the protocols, and then see if they can be applied to proprietary as well as open-source solutions. We also want to help make any system multi-tenant ready so it can accept requests from different users without any fear of compromise.</span></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdLDmPk0LDS7l10SMWsim0L5psmJrc-J7ym30UTAkL9wAZ8LDUZYeDOCbqpX7gnikc9PQE9ixG7ZFdLJ30W09r4rm8ElbAioUx9WXsc5HOMGjGMtj_Muw2tDpIyTW8VSkn_MA1aqaCId0/s1600/tredisec.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdLDmPk0LDS7l10SMWsim0L5psmJrc-J7ym30UTAkL9wAZ8LDUZYeDOCbqpX7gnikc9PQE9ixG7ZFdLJ30W09r4rm8ElbAioUx9WXsc5HOMGjGMtj_Muw2tDpIyTW8VSkn_MA1aqaCId0/s400/tredisec.jpg" width="287" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">(click to enlarge)</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">AS:<span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> Another interesting facet of this project is that it combines different aspects of security. For example, my colleague <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/angelo-de-caro-7954625">Angelo De Caro</a> is a cryptographer, and <a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-EUG">Matthias Neugschwandtner</a> is system security researcher (a white-hat hacker). They have complementary skills<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">;</span>one looks at the cryptographic aspects of the problems, solutions and the protocols, while the other one looks at the security of its implementation and possible vulnerabilities. </span></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">At the end of the day the system is as strong as its weakest link, so the problem must be analysed and understood from both standpoints.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"></span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Q. So what’s the first demonstration where this could work? Do you have a milestone in<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;"> mind</span> to test this in a data-center with a client? </span></b></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-EUG">Matthias Neugschwandtner</a> (MN): <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">We’re working with a good set of use<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;"> </span>case partners, including cloud service providers from both Greece and Spain where we will test some of our work. This should give us a good platform for testing and improving<span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif;">.</span></span> </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">At this point we are making good progress and will have more to report in the coming months.</span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Follow updates on the project <a href="https://twitter.com/TREDISECproject?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@TREDISECproject</a></span></i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">. </span></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The project has received funding from the European Commission under the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) theme of the Horizon 2020 framework programme (H2020-ICT-2014-1). The project started in April 2015, coordinated by Atos with partners NEC Europe (United Kingdom), ETH Zurich (Switzerland), IBM Research (Switzerland), Eurecom (France), Arsys (Spain), GRNET (Greece), SAP (Germany) and Morpho (France). </span></i><br /><br /><i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;">More information about the project is available at </span></i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><a href="http://www.tredisec.eu/"><b><i>www.tredisec.eu</i></b></a><i>.</i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div style="mso-element: comment-list;"><div style="mso-element: comment;"><div class="msocomtxt" id="_com_1" language="JavaScript"></div></div></div>

cloud EU H2020 IBM Research - Zurich IBM Scientists Bring Trust and Reliability to the Cloud with AdvancedCryptography in EU Project

Editor's note: this interview is by Katherina Eleftheriou , IBM Research-Zurich media relations. Connected “things” – everything fro...

IBM Scientists Invent a Thermometer for the Nanoscale

2:30 AM N1000 0

<i><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">The IBM lab responsible for inventing the scanning tunneling microscope and the atomic force microscope has invented another critical tool for helping us understand the nanoworld.</span></i><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Accurately measuring the temperature of objects at the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanoscopic_scale" target="_blank">nanoscale</a> has been challenging scientists for decades. Current techniques are not accurate and they typically generate artifacts, limiting their reliability. </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Motivated by this challenge and their need to precisely characterize the temperature of new transistor designs <a href="https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/44357.wss" target="_blank">to meet the demand of future cognitive computers</a>, scientists in Switzerland from IBM and ETH Zurich have invented a breakthrough technique to measure the temperature of nano- and macro-sized objects. The patent-pending invention is being disclosed for the first time today in the peer-review journal <i><a href="http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2016/160303/ncomms10874/full/ncomms10874.html" style="font-size: 12pt;" target="_blank">Nature Communications</a>, "Temperature mapping of operating nanoscale devices by scanning probe thermometry (</i></span><i><span style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, helvetica, 'ＭＳ Ｐゴシック', 'ＭＳ ゴシック', Osaka, 'MS PGothic', sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">doi:10.1038/ncomms10874)</span><span style="font-family: 'helvneue light for ibm', sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"</span></i><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 252.0pt 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; text-autospace: none;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></i><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/7yjL_TDP_Ss" width="560"></iframe></span><br /><a name="more"></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 252.0pt 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; text-autospace: none;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div> <b><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">A History of Invention</span></b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">In the 1980s, IBM scientists Gerd Binnig and the late Heinrich Rohrer wanted to directly explore a surface’s electronic structure and imperfections. The instrument they needed to take such measurements didn’t exist, yet. So they did what any good scientist would do: they invented one. It became known as the <a href="http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/microscope/" target="_blank">scanning tunneling microscope</a> (STM), opening the door to nanotechnology. Just a few years later, the invention was recognized with the highest of honors, the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1986.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"><br /><span style="color: black;">More than 30 years later IBM scientists continue to follow in the footsteps of Binnig and Rohrer and with their latest invention.</span></span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Dr. <a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-FAM" target="_blank">Fabian Menges</a>, an IBM postdoc and co-inventor of the technique said, “We started back in 2010 and simply never gave up. Previous research was focused on a nanoscale thermometer, but we should have been inventing a thermometer for the nanoscale — an important distinction. This adjustment led us to develop a technique which combines local thermal sensing with the measuring capability of a microscope — we call it <a href="http://e-collection.library.ethz.ch/eserv/eth:47862/eth-47862-02.pdf" target="_blank">scanning probe thermometry</a>.”</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 252.0pt 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; text-autospace: none;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1609/24533887792_d18d4d3576_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1609/24533887792_d18d4d3576_z.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">IBM scientist Fabian Menges with his invention.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 252.0pt 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; text-autospace: none;"> <b><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">How it Works: A Scanning Probe Thermometry</span></b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">The most common technique to measure temperature on the macroscale is to bring a thermometer into thermal contact with the sample. This is how a fever thermometer works. Once it’s placed under our tongue it equilibrates to our body temperature so that we can determine our temperature at a healthy 37 degrees C. Unfortunately, it gets a little more challenging when using a thermometer to measure a nanoscopic object.</span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">For example, it would be impossible to use a typical thermometer to measure the temperature of an individual virus. The size of the virus is too small and the thermometer cannot equilibrate without significantly disturbing the virus temperature.</span><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">To solve this challenge, IBM scientists developed a single scan non-equilibrium contact thermometry technique to measure the temperature of nanoscopic objects using a scanning probe.</span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">As the scanning probe thermometer and the object cannot thermally equilibrate at the nanoscale, two signals are measured simultaneously: a small heat flux, and its resistance to heat flow. Combining these two signal the temperature of nanoscopic objects can then be quantified for an accurate result. </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">IBM scientist Dr. <a href="http://researcher.watson.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=zurich-bgo" target="_blank">Bernd Gotsmann</a> and co-inventor explains, “The technique is analogous to touching a hot plate and inferring its temperature from sensing the heat flux between our own body and the heat source. Essentially, the tip of the probe is our the hand. Our perception to hot and cold can be very helpful to get an idea of an objects temperature, but it can also be misleading if the resistance to heat flow is unknown.” </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Previously, scientists weren’t accurately including this resistance dependence; but only measuring the rate of the thermal energy transfer through the surface, know as heat flux. In the paper, the authors included the effects of local variations of thermal resistance to measure the temperature of an indium arsenide (InAs) nanowire, and a self-heated gold interconnect with a combination of a few-miliKelvin and few-nanometer spatial resolution.</span><br /><br /></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1587/24346717690_49899b720d_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1587/24346717690_49899b720d_z.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">From left to right, IBM scientists Nico Mosso, </span><br /><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">Bernd Gotsmann, Fabian Motzfeld and Fabian Menges in</span><br /><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">the Noise Free Lab with the scanning probe thermometer.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Menges adds, "Not only is the scanning probe thermometer accurate, it meets the trifecta for tools: it's easy to operate, simple to build, and very versatile, in that it can be used to measure the temperature of nano- and micro-sized hot spots that can locally effect the physical properties of materials or govern chemical reactions in devices such as transistors, memory cells, thermoelectric energy converters or plasmonic structures. The applications are endless.”<b> </b></span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"><br /><b><span style="color: black;">Noise Free Labs</span></b> </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">It’s no coincidence that the team began to see improvements in the development of the scanning probe thermometer 18 months ago when they moved their research into the new Noise Free Labs -- six meters underground at the <a href="http://www.research.ibm.com/labs/zurich/brnc.html" target="_blank">Binnig and Rohrer Nanotechnology Center</a>on the campus of IBM Research-Zurich. </span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">This unique environment, which shields the experiments from vibration, acoustic noise, electromagnetic signals and temperature fluctuations, helped the team achieve sub-milliKelvin precision.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">“While we had the benefit of this unique room, the technique can also produce reliable results in normal environment,” said Menges.</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><br /><b><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">Next Steps</span></b><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span><br /><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">“We hope the paper will produce both a lot of excitement and relief for scientists, who like us, have been searching for such a tool,” said Gotsmann. “Similar to the STM, we hope to license this technique to tool manufacturers who can then bring it to market as an additional function to their microscopy product line.”</span><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span>   <br /><i><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"><br /></span></i><i><span style="color: black; font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;">The scientists would like to thank the 7th Program Framework for its support under the <a href="http://www.nanoheat-project.eu/">NANOHEAT</a> project and the Swiss National Science Foundation.</span></i><span style="font-family: "helvneue light for ibm" , sans-serif; font-size: 13.0pt;"></span><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><o:p></o:p><br />

AFM IBM Research - Zurich nanodevices nanotechnology scanning probe thermometry IBM Scientists Invent a Thermometer for the Nanoscale

The IBM lab responsible for inventing the scanning tunneling microscope and the atomic force microscope has invented another critical tool ...