Semiconductor Processing & Production News

  1. Bright Ideas: 10/13/21 — U.S. Gets First Open-Access Silicon Carbide Fabrication Facility, Light Produced From "Nothing" 10/13/2021

    Bright Ideas presents the most captivating news and innovations in photonics. This week, L3Harris landed an $18.4 million contract to continue providing its electro-optical sensor systems to the U.S. military, chalcogenide glasses became useful in the visible and UV spectrum, and a more practical, less harmful phosphorescent material is found in wood. 

  2. Bright Ideas: 9/22/21 — NASA & LISA To Catch Ripples in Gravitational Field, Nikon Picks 'Small World' Winners 9/22/2021

    Bright Ideas presents the most captivating news and innovations in photonics. This week, a 3-mile laser beam successfully transmitted data across the Congo River and between two African cities, a new polarimetric imaging method is helping take clearer pictures in murky water, and the secret to cooking juicier chicken is... lasers?

  3. Physik Instrumente Acquires P·G·W, Japanese Granite Base Machining Company 3/18/2021

    The new acquisition will provide granite plates with high flatness and system integration capabilities for PI’s nanopositioning solutions used by leaders in the semiconductor, life sciences, photonics, and industrial automation markets.

  4. The Light Side Of The Force 2/12/2021

    A group of researchers from the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society and the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin have found out that a semiconductor can be converted to a metal and back by light more easily and more quickly than previously thought.

  5. Brightening The Future Of Semiconductor-Based Photocatalytic Processes 2/1/2021

    A collaboration between the Pericàs group with Prof. Timothy Noël and Dr. Paola Riente at the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e, The Netherlands), has crystallised in a Nature Communications paper where they provide key insight into the chemical nature of the true photocatalyst involved in the Bi2O3-driven atom-transfer radical addition (ATRA) reaction.

  6. Research Could Dramatically Lower Cost Of Electron Sources 2/1/2021

    Rice University engineers have discovered technology that could slash the cost of semiconductor electron sources, key components in devices ranging from night-vision goggles and low-light cameras to electron microscopes and particle accelerators.

  7. An Improved Wearable, Stretchable Gas Sensor Using Nanocomposites 8/27/2020

    A stretchable, wearable gas sensor for environmental sensing has been developed and tested by researchers at Penn State, Northeastern University and five universities in China.

  8. Perovskite And Organic Solar Cells Prove Successful On A Rocket Flight In Space 8/13/2020

    Almost all satellites are powered by solar cells – but solar cells are heavy. While conventional high-performance cells reach up to three watts of electricity per gram, perovskite and organic hybrid cells could provide up to ten times that amount.

  9. Molecular Additives Enhance Mechanical Properties Of Organic Solar Cell Material 8/12/2020

    Organic solar cells are ideal for use in flexible electronics because of the inherently malleable nature of semiconducting polymers. Recent research on the interplay between processing, thermodynamics and mechanical stability of typical photoactive layers in organic cells is providing a deeper understanding of these high-potential materials.

  10. Painting With Crystals 8/10/2020

    Semiconductors made of organic materials, e.g. for light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and solar cells, could replace or supplement silicon-based electronics in the future. The efficiency of such devices depends crucially on the quality of thin layers of such organic semiconductors.