France launches a 4.2M euro spintronics project

France has launched a large Spintronics project, with a 4.2M euro investment. It's called SPIN, and involved 11 partners. One of the project goals is magnetic FPGAs. Here's how they describe it:

The objective will be to design a magnetic FPGA which will incorporate finely distributed Magnetic Tunnel Junctions (MTJs) for non volatile storage and configuration purposes above of a CMOS core circuit. In complement of existing high density FPGAs, it will provide better versatility with intrinsic reconfigurability, instant on/off and energy saving. Such FPGAs can be used as general purpose standalone products. In the SPIN project, the FPGA will be targeted to provide intelligent processing of the magnetometers and sensors developed in objectives 2 and 3. 

More information can be found here.

Posted: Dec 22,2009 by Ron Mertens