Chapter 883: Integration of Millions of Carbon Nanotubes

The twenty-ninth day of the lunar year, New Year's Eve. The lights are bright and the atmosphere is joyful.

The bright red lanterns are hung under the eaves, and the sound of firecrackers and laughter are intertwined in the air, which is the unique melody of the New Year.

After eating the reunion dinner, the family huddled in the living room and watched the Spring Festival Gala, which was tasteless but seemed to be missing something if they didn't watch it.

Picking up a handful of melon seeds from the snack plate on the table, Xu Chuan cracked two and looked at Xu Xiao who was playing with his mobile phone, and asked:

"Speaking of which, how is your research work on brain-computer interface and biochip going now?"

Xu Xiao put down his mobile phone and sighed with some annoyance: "Preparing for clinical trials, the reply from the other side is that the earliest qualification approval may have to wait until March or April of the new year."

"If it's slow, I don't know how long it will take."

Clinical trials are scientific research, in which researchers investigate the effects of drugs or equipment on diseases or personal overall health.

There are generally two types, one is patient trials, and the other is healthy people trials.

In China, no matter which kind, human clinical trials in medicine have always been very strict and difficult to apply for.

Most of the hospitals that are qualified to do this level of projects are tertiary hospitals.

The brain-computer interface company in Xu Xiao's hands can apply for medical human clinical trials. On the one hand, the company's size is there.

A company with nearly 30 billion RMB, and in the cutting-edge scientific and technological field of brain-computer interface, can be said to be the top in China.

Even Shuimu's previous joint research with the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT did not have this scale.

On the other hand, it is naturally the influence of her brother Xu Chuan.

It is precisely because of this that Xu Xiao was able to apply for human clinical trials in December of the second half of the year, and she will be able to get the license around March next year.

Three months is almost the standard for the domestic human clinical trial review system.

However, Xu Xiao is not very clear about these things. It is not certain that she can get the clinical trial qualification in three months, which makes her very troubled.

Xu Chuan smiled and said, "Since the Supervisory Administration has already responded to you, wait a little longer. Three months is not a long time. It is better to be strict in medicine."

"Don't forget that the technology you are researching now is to cure diseases and save lives."

"The impact of brain neural interfaces on the human body must be subject to detailed experiments to ensure that there are no problems before it can be applied to the human body."

"Do you understand?"

The process of human clinical trials is not only strict in China, but also in most countries.

Of course, except for India.

The review of medical clinical trials in that place is unprecedentedly bad.

For example, in 2008, India's official media exposed a scandal by itself, which caused an uproar and simply refreshed the bottom line of human civilization.

The All India Center for Medical Sciences in New Delhi is well-known in the pharmaceutical industry and has long provided cheap services to the public. Many medical students are proud to receive training here.

But the fact is that since January 2006, this center has secretly cooperated with at least 5 European and American pharmaceutical companies. In order to conduct the final stage of testing a drug, 4,142 infants were arranged to participate in 42 clinical trials.

What's worse is that many parents of infants complained that their children were not seriously ill.

Because the children had some minor illnesses and went to see a doctor, the doctor arranged for long-term hospitalization on the grounds that the problem was serious. They never dreamed that their children would be sent to the trial.

And these clinical trials lasted for 30 months.

Among these infants, 2,728 were less than 1 year old.

As a result, it was reported that 49 infants died after the drug trial.

As for how many infants and young children died behind the scenes, or left serious sequelae during the drug trial, it is unknown.

In addition, from 2005 to 2012, only 17 new drugs passed the inspection among 475 drug trial projects in India.

In the past seven years, about 570,000 people have participated in clinical drug trials, of which 2,644 died due to drug trials.

In addition, there were more than 120,000 accidents caused by side effects of new drugs.

This is just the information reported by the Indian Daily, and it is just the tip of the iceberg of the Indian pharmaceutical industry.

Such cruel medical experiments are inseparable from the extremely relaxed clinical trials in India.

Generally speaking, it takes about twelve years for a new drug to be launched on the market; research and development, animal testing, and clinical trials are the three major steps.

The last step of clinical trials is divided into three phases, which takes about six or seven years.

In most countries, before the development of clinical medicines and the final clinical trials on humans, countless experiments and animal tests must be carried out.

But in India, animal testing can be bypassed on many "drugs" or "medical devices."

Simply put, it means doing less, or using bionic organ simulation instead, or even not doing it directly.

No matter which country these drugs are developed in, and no matter what the previous testing standards are, as long as they can meet the first phase of clinical trial standards, they can be used for human clinical trials in India.

To put it bluntly, India agrees that the world's pharmaceutical giants can do "human experiments" in India.

In return, India has the privileged and defaulted "patent invalidation right" in the pharmaceutical industry, that is, generic drugs do not have to pay patent fees as long as they change a little bit of the preparation steps.

Whether it is good or bad, it is difficult to evaluate.

The "loose" human experiment regulations have caused countless ordinary people to suffer from difficulties and illnesses, and even died from it.

But on the contrary, as a superpower with a population of more than one billion, this system has also brought a large number of generic drugs to the poor ordinary people in India, allowing more people to avoid the situation of not being able to afford medicine after getting sick.

As for China, it was actually similar to India at the beginning.

Not only India has "special national patent rights", but China actually had them in the last century.

But China took another completely opposite path and established a more complete medical system.

If Xu Xiao's brain neural interface chip and related technologies want to be released, they must pass the domestic medical system review and human clinical trials.

New Year's Eve is here, and the Spring Festival is coming.

The fireworks and firecrackers at midnight are more dazzling than the stars in the sky.

After visiting relatives at his grandmother's house on the second day of the Chinese New Year, Xu Chuan had a lot of free time.

Although someone would send him WeChat messages and call him every day to wish him a happy new year, most of these things were of the type that he could reply or not.

Taking advantage of the free time during the Spring Festival, Xu Chuan took out his computer from his backpack.

I was free anyway, so I might as well make arrangements for the next work on carbon-based chips.

Turning on the computer and casually creating a new document on the desktop, Xu Chuan pondered for a while and wrote down the title of the document.

"Suggestions on the rapid completion of research and industrial production of carbon-based chips"

Looking at the title in front of him, Xu Chuan thought about it and added the word (first draft) after the title.

Before returning from the Spring Festival last year, the research on carbon-based chips had made certain breakthroughs, at least in the integration of carbon nanotubes.

This was simulated after he personally led people to study the "Yaochi Crystal".

During the Spring Festival, researchers at the Xinghai Research Institute and the Materials Research Institute have been following his research direction to continue to advance this matter.

Although the institute as a whole will be on holiday during the Spring Festival, it does not mean that no one will stay.

Even during the Spring Festival, a large research institute with tens of thousands of people will have many managers and researchers staying to work overtime to maintain the operation of the institute.

The carbon-based chip is the focus of the Institute of Materials at present.

This is a wider and more difficult road than silicon-based chips. Now that there is a glimmer of hope, how can we not stimulate the researchers in the institute?

Moreover, for the Institute of Materials, this is their first S-level project.

If the Spring Festival is not too important to the Chinese people, most of the researchers in the project team may choose to stay and work overtime.

In just a few days, the Institute of Materials has made a major breakthrough in the integration of carbon nanotubes in carbon-based chips.

For the first time, the number of integrated carbon nanotubes in an area of ​​​​one square millimeter has exceeded one million, and with each experimental research and technical optimization, this number is still rising rapidly.

According to the estimate of the Institute of Materials, before the tenth day of the first lunar month, they hope to make a carbon-based substrate with tens of millions of carbon nanotubes integrated.

Although this is just a carbon-based substrate, not a real carbon-based chip, and it is still a long way from the integration density of silicon-based chips, which has exceeded 200 million transistors per square millimeter.

But for the research of carbon-based chips, this is undoubtedly a major breakthrough.

You know, before this, the number of carbon-based chip transistors was only a few thousand, and it was integrated in the laboratory at a huge cost.

And now, through a simpler and cheaper method, they easily achieved the orderly integration of millions of carbon nanotubes on a carbon-based substrate.

Scientific research is like this. If you don’t find the right research direction, then your progress is like groping in the fog of chaos.

But if you find a right research direction, the rapid progress will be like embarking on a broad road.

After the Spring Festival, visiting relatives, and staying at home until the eighth day of the Lunar New Year, Xu Chuan was ready to leave and return to Jinling.

Compared with previous years when he would leave almost after the 12th day of the New Year or even the Lantern Festival, he did leave earlier this year.

Mainly concerned about the research on carbon-based chips.

The "Yaochi Crystal" found on the impact wall of Yaochi Crater on the back of the moon has brought a major breakthrough in the research of carbon-based chips.

The problem of neat and orderly arrangement of carbon nanotubes has been solved to the greatest extent. The rest is undoubtedly to seize the time and work hard to develop a real carbon-based integrated chip.

To be honest, Xu Chuan can't do much in the research of carbon-based chips.

On the one hand, he is not a scholar in the field of chips and knows little about this field.

On the other hand, the research and preparation of chips is a systematic super project.

Strictly speaking, the preparation of chips is similar to the controlled nuclear fusion project he presided over.

Both are composed of "blocks".

Just like building blocks, the blocks are repaired into the desired shape with tools, and then assembled together to form a house.

For example, the research and development of chips involves multiple steps and processes such as circuit diagram planning and design, manufacturing of single-crystal silicon rounds, thin film deposition, photolithography exposure, etching and injection of plasma, and finished product packaging.

Each step and each process in the middle needs to solve many problems.

For example, the design of the circuit diagram is related to multiple factors such as functional requirements, circuit topology, and signal transmission speed.

The manufacturing of single-crystal silicon rounds also involves problems such as ultra-high purity single-crystal silicon preparation and ultra-smooth cut surfaces.

There is no need to say more about controlled nuclear fusion technology.

Whether it is the control of high-temperature plasma turbulence, the first wall material, or the recovery of tritium, they are all the most advanced and difficult problems in the world.

If there is a difference, of course there is.

The research and development of chips will not be more difficult than controlled nuclear fusion technology.

Because it is already a road that Western countries have taken, and before Xu Chuan officially completed the controlled nuclear fusion technology, there was no way ahead.

However, compared with controlled nuclear fusion technology, the research and development of chips is more complicated and more systematic and comprehensive.

Because it requires a complete industrial system that involves almost all industries.

The EUV extreme ultraviolet lithography machine produced by ASML has parts from many countries such as the European Union, East Asia, and North America.

In this regard, let alone the windmill country that controls ASML, even the United States does not have the ability to produce the most advanced low-nanometer chips alone.

The only country in the world that has this industrial system and ability is China.

But China's defect is that it has a complete industrial system, but some of the fields involved are still a long way from the top.

For example, the preparation technology of ultra-high purity single crystal silicon ingots, currently only a handful of countries such as Sakura Country, the United States, and Germany have this technology.

The ultra-smooth lenses used in EUV extreme ultraviolet lithography machines can only be provided by Zeiss in Germany.

So strictly speaking, if China wants to complete the research and development of chips on its own, it is tantamount to using the power of one country to challenge the research results of the past few decades of Western countries in the world.

It is normal to be difficult to break through.

But now, another wider track is in front of us.

Carrying her backpack, she pushed open the door of the office.

In the assistant room, Tang Ran had come to work early.

Seeing Xu Chuan, she stood up with a smile and greeted him happily: "Professor, Happy New Year. Why don't you stay at home for a few more days to rest."

"Happy New Year."

Xu Chuan nodded with a smile, greeted him and said: "I want to, but the work here is more important."

After a slight pause, he continued: "Since you are here, please help me deal with some things."

"Professor, you say." Tang Ran replied quickly.

Xu Chuan: "Help me collect information about major domestic manufacturers that research silicon-based chips and carbon-based chips, and also help me make an appointment with Lei Zong of Xiaomi Group. Ask him when it is convenient. I want to meet him."

Hearing Xu Chuan's request, Tang Ran didn't think much and quickly replied: "Okay, Professor, is there anything else?"

"No, just sort out these materials for me as soon as possible."

"Okay, I'll go right away."