National Institute of Materials Science (NIMS) and Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) announced that a joint research group of International Center for Materials Nanoarchitectonics, NIMS, and Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Los Angeles succeeded in developing a new inorganic device named “synapse device”, which automatically realizes two types of functions analogous to those of the human brain, i.e., memorizing and forgetting. Details are published online in Nature Materials. The device is made with the atomic switch which consists of an Ag2S-coated metal Ag electrode and a counter electrode of platinum Pt, having a nanometer gap between the two electrodes.
