Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1471044
42 PCB007 MAGAZINE I JUNE 2022 staffs, think tanks, and reporters to explain how complex PCBs are and what needs to be done to revitalize our industry in America aer decades of decline. Q: How can industry members get involved? Weber: I think anyone who's a part of the micro- electroncs ecosystem should consider join- ing the PCBAA. e work PCBAA is doing is making a difference, but it won't be over any- time soon. e mission to educate decision- makers in Washington and around the coun- try will never be complete as the players con- stantly come and go. Because there are so many issues competing for legislators' time, we must keep our issue top of mind and keep pressure on decisionmakers throughout the agencies of government to support PCBs as part of the microelectronics ecosystem that supports everything from consumer elec- tronics and telecommunications to electron- ics systems and weapons critical to America's national security. e more members we have, the louder voice we have in Washington. One thing we can all do now is make our individ- ual voices heard by using the online contact tool that our partners at IPC have created. is contact tool sends a message directly to your nationally elected representatives to advocate for this critical legislation. It's easy to use and takes just a few minutes. PCB007 Visit pcbaa.org to learn more. Two-dimensional magnetic materials have been hailed as building blocks for the next generation of small, fast electronic devices. These materials, made of layers of crystalline sheets just a few atoms thick, gain their unique magnetic properties from the intrinsic compass-needle-like spins of their electrons. The sheets' atomic-scale thinness means that these spins can be manipulated on the finest scales using external electric fields, potentially leading to novel low-energy data storage and information processing systems. But knowing exactly how to design 2D materials with specific magnetic properties that can be precisely manipulated remains a barrier to their application. Now, as reported in the journal Science Advances, researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), UC Berkeley, Cornell, and Rutgers University have discovered layered 2D materials that can host unique magnetic features that remain stable at room temperature and could thus eventually be used in future every- day devices. Atomic-scale images of the material reveal the precise chemical and structural charac- teristics that are responsible for these features and their stability. Berkeley Lab researchers have a track record of identifying unexpected magnetic properties in atomically thin layers of bulk crystals, many based on semiconductor materials doped with metal atoms. UC Berkeley graduate student Tyler Reicha- nadter, a study co-author, calculated just how the electronic structure of common 2D materials might change by swapping out different atoms, in this case some of the iron for cobalt. This particular swapping results in a crys- tal structure that cannot be superim- posed on its mirror image, and leads to the possibility of exotic, vortex-like spin arrangements called skyrmions, which are being explored as building blocks of future low-power computing. (Source: Berkeley Lab) Skyrmions on the Rise—New 2D Material Advances Low-Power Computing