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- 3 - INTRODUCTION FUTURE SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL ENVIRONMENT Electronics Is the underpinning for the functioning of society in the Twenty-first Century. In particular, electronics forms the back- bone on which all future Navy thrusts depend: space-based systems, global command-control-communications networks, weapons sophistication, increased automation of platforms, and electronic warfare. These needs will be met depending on the effects of evolving trends in the general scientific and technical environment. As examples: o Research will become increasingly interdisciplinary, from the impact of biological understanding of neural networks to the coupling of system performance with an understanding of mate- rial and device properties. o Technologies will be combined for enhanced functionality, from the merging of analog and digital functions to achieving compatibility among presently incompatible electronics mate- rials combinations. o Three-dimensional devices will be fabricated with lateral modification on a nanometer scale, which will allow very small, high-performance structures with couplings, thereby beginning a new era of unwired arrays of nonstandard transistor structures. o Advanced sensors will be developed for monitoring such diverse physical phenomena as ocean currents, atmospheric changes, and semiconductor materials growth. o Systems will deal with massively parallel data from sensor and global communications networks. o Need will increase for understanding the fundamentals affect- ing reliable manufacture of quantum devices. We will move beyond "green thumb" electronics fabrication to computer control of processing, growth environment, and defect incor- poration based on theoretical simulations. o There will be widespread availability of ultrahigh-perfor- mance computing. o It will be possible to controllably modify the ionosphere with active plasmas in a way that fundamentally affects communications. o Systems problems will shift from implementation to the design and organization for such complex functions as command, con- trol, and communications. o Robustness of systems will be achieved through distribution of system functionality. o Memory requirements will increasingly shift to massive, nonvolatile storage. o Systems will need to deal with integration of information that is massive, incomplete, conflicting, ambiguous, and wrong. This will be true for applications ranging from battle management to electronic process control.
o High-temperature superconductors will provide devices with new functionality. o Monolithic integration of structures of materials that are incompatible today will allow optimized component function- ality well beyond the individual element capabilities avail- able today. Focus on devices will lead to combination of materials, solid state physics, and processing research for single chips having such parts as a HgCdTe sensor, with a GaAlAs light source controlled by VLSI Si integrated digital circuits. One of the major themes that emerges in considering the impact of these trends is the importance of having more interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary efforts within and among fields, as well as poten- tial new topics for investigation. This theme is reflected in the organization and topics of the panel's report, as follows: SOLID STATE ELECTRONICS o Innovative Device Focus, for combining materials, structures, and fabrication research. o Effective Utilization of Computing Power, for merging advanced characterization techniques with simulation and modeling to achieve process control, o Better Understanding of Manufacturing and Reliability Issues. o Advances in Sensors and Signal Processing. SYSTEMS AND COMMUNICATIONS THEORY o Algorithms, Networks, and Architectures, for high-speed processing. o Unreliable Links in Distribution. o Massively Parallel Systems, including neural networks. o Theory and Processing in Large Adaptive Systems. ELECTROMAGNETICS o Innovative Integrated Antenna Elements. o Electromagnetic Remote Sensing. SPACE SCIENCES o Modification of the Ionosphere. In addition to cross-disciplinary cooperative efforts, the panel notes that much of the pioneering basic research in electronics occurs in industrial research centers. The ONR, whenever possible, should continue to fund foundation research efforts in industrial research laboratories. We urge ONR program managers and members of their re- search staffs to maintain interaction with their colleagues in industry
- 5 - In order to remain aware of new developments and emphases in industrial research. The Navy should continue to be alert to opportunities for cooperation with industry on research of mutual interest. We recognize important Navy needs for scientific research in regions of power/frequency space where solid state electronics cannot provide required characteristics, as for example, gyrotrons and ubi- trons, as well as more traditional slow wave devices such as TWT and CFTs. Although there was no specific expertise on the panel to address this area, we believe that a modest investment in vacuum electronics should be part of the Navy's electronics portfolio. No attempt is made to be exhaustive in this exposition. Rather, we attempt to identify some of the most exciting current programs and suggest areas for coordination, changing emphases over time, and new initiatives. The ability to realize the potential of the broad range of electronic applications is limited by the solidity of the basic scientific foundation in a very fundamental way. We have attempted to identify critical thrusts for making major advances in electronics research.
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