Theoretical analysis of magneto-inductive THZ wireless communications and power transfer with multi-layer graphene nano-coils

Abstract

Graphene with significant potentials in diverse areas of physical and biological sciences is proposed as a solution to complementary problems of semiconductor and biomedical industries, i.e., the on-chip (OC) interconnect bottleneck and in-body (IB) wireless communications/power transfer (PT), respectively. Emerging nanoscale solutions with radio frequency, optical, ultrasonic, or molecular channels in OC and IB media have various challenges including achievable footprints and frequency, energy consumption, medium dependent features, and interference. In this paper, major challenges are addressed with magneto-inductive (MI) transceivers by combining the advantages of THz operation frequency, unique features of intercalated multi-layer graphene (MLG) coils and range extension with MI waveguides. Our design promises scalable and high performance solutions for the OC interconnect bottleneck while providing biocompatible and universal solutions for challenging IB medium. The proposed solution is theoretically analyzed and numerically compared with the copper-based alternatives, and the practical challenges are discussed. Simulation results achieve high capacity (several Tbit/s) and ultra-low power (500 zJ/bit) wireless communications while providing high (hundreds of kWs) and efficient (109 W/mm2) wireless PT at several millimeters. In addition, unique properties of MLG such as lightweight structure, biocompatibility, current carrying capacity, and planar manufacturability make the solution more promising for challenging environments.