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Activity (Hands-On)Grades 9 - 12

Design Without Building: Simulating the Process of Engineering Memristor Materials

A photo showing five cardboard sheets, each featuring several white plastic drinking straws, some straight and others bent at the flexible neck, taped down with clear adhesive tape.Student prototypes

Memristors are next-generation computer hardware components that increase computational efficiency while reducing energy requirements. In this activity, students ask and answer the question, “How do materials scientists design memristors by predicting material properties at the atomic scale?” Students research the process of computational analysis used to identify possible materials, as well as the crystal structures of the materials themselves. Students then are challenged to imagine and plan ways to model memristors using simple materials available in the classroom. Students test and refine their models in an iterative design process that mimics the procedures used by professional materials scientists.

Modern computer hardware is built on transistors. These devices use the properties of semiconductors to transmit data and perform computational analyses. The ability of engineers to identify materials that can enable smaller and more efficient computer hardware is essential as computational power for applications such as artificial intelligence, and the energy needed for those computations, increases in the near future. Materials scientists use computational analysis to identify promising materials for use in memristors, which are poised to replace transistors in next-generation computer technologies. An understanding of the function of memristors, as well as the processes used to design these hardware components, is foundational for future engineers and scientists.

After this activity, students should be able to:

  • Model how algorithms can be used to iteratively arrive at an optimal solution.
  • Describe the functional difference between a transistor and a memristor.
  • Explain, at the atomic level, how the structure of memristor material relates to the properties.
  • Recognize and explain when and why simulations are useful, especially in cases where physical experiments are difficult or expensive.

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