Cleanroom helps MIT researchers complete product development
A Class 100 cleanroom was the solution researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT; Cambridge, MA) came up with when they were faced with several problems during the development of a dime-sized silicon chip that could some day be implanted or ingested into the human body to deliver drugs, detect chemicals or diagnose disease. The chip uses materials and techniques employed in traditional semiconductor manufacturing, but to create it, researchers had to overcome technical challenges in material selection, process design and reservoir filling. The gold they chose as the material for the membrane that covers each reservoir was suitable, except for the particulates deposited in deposition or introduced by processing the metal at temperatures above 700 degrees Celsius, which could cause defects in the membrane. Utilizing a cleanroom environment helped remedy the situation and allowed MIT to continue product development. — TGW