Fèlix Casanova receives the Intel Outstanding Researcher Award for the second time
Ikerbasque Research Professor Fèlix Casanova, co-leader of the Nanodevices group at nanoGUNE, has received the Intel Outstanding Researcher Award 2022 for his contributions to MESO technology, a technology that, ever since its inception, has taken the memory, interconnections and logic requirements of future computational needs into account. Casanova was recognized by Intel in the 2020 awards, so this is the second time that he has received this recognition, which dates back to 2012.
Finding a replacement for today’s electronic technology to make it smaller, faster and, most importantly, more energy-efficient, i.e. so that it consumes less, is a global challenge. In recent years, Fèlix Casanova and his nanoGUNE team have been working in collaboration with the multinational Intel on a research project aimed at improving the performance and energy savings of future computers by optimizing MESO technology.
“In today's computers, memory and processor are physically separated, in other words, the data always have to travel from the memory to the processor, where the operation you want done is carried out, and then back to the memory, and so on,” explained Fèlix Casanova. “This becomes a bottleneck since a lot of time and energy are wasted while information is being transferred between one device and another. So one of the solutions to tackle this problem is to develop circuits that integrate both memory and data processing into a single circuit: MESO technology,” added the nanoGUNE researcher.
As Intel pointed out, “in selecting the award winners, careful consideration is given to the fundamental insights, industrial relevance, technical difficulty, communications and potential student hiring associated with a candidate’s research program”. They also emphasized that “Fèlix Casanova's contributions are eminently deserving” and highlight “his constant efforts to advance his group towards the creation of new knowledge and the obtaining of revolutionary experimental results”.
“It is a source of great satisfaction that Intel should once again highlight our collaboration through this recognition, which I extend to the whole team involved in the project. It is proof that from here, from the Basque CIC nanoGUNE center, we are really advancing this promising technology,” said Fèlix Casanova.