Abstract
Silicon has been the dominant material in microelectronics for a half century. Other materials, however, have subsidiary roles in microelectronics manufacturing. A few materials have even been promoted as replacements for silicon. Yet because of silicon’s dominance, none of these alternatives has gone from bench to brand; nor could any of them progress from brand to bench. For these reasons, historians have paid little attention to silicon and almost none to other microelectronics materials. I show, however, that we can better understand how the organization of the semiconductor (silicon) industry has changed over time by examining alternative microelectronic materials. I do so by presenting two case studies: one of a superconducting computing program at IBM, the most likely candidate to overthrow silicon in the ‘70s; the other of carbon fullerenes, the most likely candidates to overthrow silicon today.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | From Bench to Brand and Back: The Co-Shaping of Materials and Chemists in the Twentieth Century |
Editors | Pierre Teissier, Cyrus C. M. Mody, Brigitte van Tiggelen |
Place of Publication | Nantes |
Publisher | Cahiers Francois Viète |
Pages | 217-241 |
Number of pages | 25 |
Volume | Série III |
Edition | 2 |
ISBN (Print) | 978-2-86939-244-3 |
Publication status | Published - 2017 |