Shrinking transistors has driven computing performance for decades, but the approach is hitting physical and economic limits. Today’s leading chips, like Apple’s A17 Pro and M4 processors built on TSMC’s 3 nm process, feature transistors with gate lengths below 15 nm.
At this scale, electrons start tunneling through barriers meant to contain them, causing current leakage even when devices are off. The result is wasted energy, excess heat, and diminishing returns on efficiency improvements that once accompanied each generation of smaller transistors.
Meanwhile, building a 3 nm fabrication facility now costs over $20 billion. These challenges have renewed interest in a radically different idea: using individual molecules as functional electronic components.
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