Nanoelectronics
Such capabilities are seen as being particularly useful for modelling the characteristics of single electron transistors (SETs) that confine electrons to sufficiently small dimensions in metals or semiconductors, allowing the transistor to turn on and off each time one electron is added to it. This is achieved through a single electron tunnelling process during which electron transports take place only if certain energy conditions are fulfilled. Even then the occurrence of such an event follows statistical rules. Unlike field-effect transistors whose operation employs classical physics concepts, single electron devices are based on quantum phenomena. These devices make use of the quantised nature of charge, which does not flow continuously but in a lumpy way.
The quantum mechanical nature of the operation of SETs necessitates different approaches for the computation of their characteristics, such as conductance and charge densities such as density functional theory (DFT) and quantum statistics calculations.