Yearly Archives: 2017

At the SC17 show, Micron Technology, Inc., (Nasdaq:MU) today announced a new 32GB NVDIMM-N offering twice the capacity of existing NVDIMMs, providing system designers and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) with new flexibility to work with larger data sets in fast persistent memory.

The solution is architected to support the increasing performance, energy efficiency and uptime requirements of data analytics and online transaction processing applications. Compared to server configurations using traditional far storage, deploying NVDIMMs can deliver up to 400 percent performance benefits.

As data center storage volumes grow, database queries increasingly need key datasets to be retained in-memory to improve access speeds due to the rising business requirement for higher availability. Many businesses are seeing increased value in placing fast memory near the processor to reduce the need to transfer data from far storage.

Persistent memory delivers a unique balance of latency, bandwidth, capacity and cost by delivering ultra-fast DRAM speeds for critical data. What sets it apart from standard server DRAM is its ability to preserve information in the event of a power loss. Micron’s technology provides a unique solution for near-memory data analysis and addresses rising bandwidth demands of data-rich applications in markets such as finance, medicine, retail, and oil and gas exploration.

NVDIMM has emerged as a critical persistent memory technology due to its ability to deliver the performance levels of DRAM combined with the persistent reliability of NAND. It reduces the bandwidth gap between memory and storage.

Applications which require frequent updates — such as journaling or transactional logging of metadata — now have the capability to leverage NVDIMM for these functions instead of traditional far storage. Micron’s NVDIMM allows customers to raise read-centric performance by 11 percent and write-centric performance by 63 percent for block level data.

“As data sets get larger and larger, data access becomes increasingly critical to application performance,” said Tom Eby, senior vice president for Micron’s Compute and Networking Business Unit. “Our new 32GB NVDIMM-N equips system architects with a high-capacity persistent memory solution that can dramatically increase throughput and improve total cost of ownership.”

VMware and Dell are collaborating with Micron to increase the performance for virtualized applications. With virtual persistent memory, customers can now run multiple operating systems in a virtualized environment while reducing overall network traffic.

“As the global leader in cloud infrastructure and business mobility, VMware recognized early the significant reduction of database and local storage latencies that Micron NVDIMM-N can bring to our virtualized customers using Dell PowerEdge servers,” said Richard A. Brunner, chief platform architect and vice president of Server Platform Technologies at VMware, Inc. “Using the 16 GB NVDIMM-N from Micron for the Dell PowerEdge 14G servers, a future version of VMware vSphere(R) intends to efficiently grow the number and size of virtualized persistent memory workloads in the data center while ensuring the benefits of live migration, check-pointing, and legacy storage optimizations for NVDIMM. VMware looks forward to the improvements that can arise when the server industry starts deploying the new 32 GB Micron NVDIMM-N to our customers.”

“Persistent memory solutions enables our customers to optimize intensive database and analytics workloads,” said Robert Hormuth, vice president and fellow, Server Division CTO at Dell EMC. “Micron’s advancement in persistent memory offering and Dell EMC engineering efforts to enhance NVDIMM capability of PowerEdge servers will boost application performance, reduce system crash recovery time and enhance SSD endurance for our customers.”

EV Group (EVG), a supplier of wafer bonding and lithography equipment for the MEMS, nanotechnology and semiconductor markets, and Leti, an institute of CEA Tech, today announced the world’s first successful 300-mm wafer-to-wafer direct hybrid bonding with pitch dimension connections as small as 1µm (micron). This breakthrough also achieved copper pads as small as 500nm.

The copper/oxide hybrid bonding process, a key enabler for 3D high-density IC applications, was demonstrated in Leti’s cleanrooms using EVG’s fully automated GEMINI FB XT fusion wafer bonding system. This result was obtained in the framework of the program IRT Nanoelec headed by Leti. EVG joined the institute’s 3D Integration Consortium in February 2016.

Wafer bonding an enabling process for 3D device stacking

Vertical stacking of semiconductor devices has become an increasingly viable approach to enabling continuous improvements in device density and performance. Wafer-to-wafer bonding is an essential process step to enable 3D stacked devices. However, tight alignment and overlay accuracy between the wafers is required to achieve good electrical contact between the interconnected device on the bonded wafers, as well as to minimize the interconnect area at the bond interface so that more space can be made available on the wafer for producing devices. The constant reduction in pitches that are needed to support component roadmaps is fueling tighter wafer-to-wafer bonding specifications with each new product generation.

Demonstration results

In the Leti demonstration, the top and bottom 300mm wafers were directly bonded in the GEMINI FB XT automated production fusion bonding system, which incorporates EVG’s proprietary SmartView NT face-to-face aligner and an alignment verification module to enable in-situ post-bond IR alignment measurement. The system achieved overlay alignment accuracy to within 195nm (3-sigma) overall, with mean alignment results well centered below 15nm. Post-bake acoustic microscopy scans of the full 300mm bonded wafer stack as well as specific dies confirmed a defect-free bonding interface for pitches ranging from 1µm to 4µm with optimum copper density.

Focused Ion Beam Scanning Electron Microscope (FIB-SEM) cross-section of 1-µm pitch copper pads on a pair of 300-mm wafers bonded with the GEMINI®FB XT automated production fusion bonding system from EV Group. Photo courtesy of Leti.

Focused Ion Beam Scanning Electron Microscope (FIB-SEM) cross-section of 1-µm pitch copper pads on a pair of 300-mm wafers bonded with the GEMINI®FB XT automated production fusion bonding system from EV Group. Photo courtesy of Leti.

“To our knowledge, this is the first reported demonstration of sub-1.5µm pitch copper hybrid bonding feasibility,” said Frank Fournel, head of bonding process engineering at Leti. “This latest demonstration represents a real breakthrough and important step forward in enabling the achievement and eventual commercialization of high-density 3D chip stacking.”

This demonstration is summarized in a paper co-authored by Leti, titled “1 µm Pitch Direct Hybrid Bonding with with <300nm Wafer-to-wafer Overlay Accuracy,” which was presented at the 2017 IEEE S3S Conference.

“3D integration holds the promise for increased device density and bandwidth as well as lower power consumption for a variety of applications, from next-generation CMOS image sensors and MEMS to high-performance computing,” stated Markus Wimplinger, corporate technology development and IP director at EV Group. “As a leader in 3D integration research and development, Leti has been at the forefront in moving this critical technology toward industry adoption and commercialization. EVG shares that vision, and we are pleased to have played a role in supporting Leti’s latest achievement in 3D integration.”

Leveraging EVG’s high-throughput XT Frame platform and an equipment front-end module (EFEM), the GEMINI FB XT automated production fusion bonding system is optimized for ultra-high throughput and productivity. The SmartView NT aligner integrated into the system provides industry-leading wafer-to-wafer overlay alignment accuracy (sub-200nm, 3-sigma). In addition, the GEMINI FB XT can accommodate up to six pre- and post-processing modules for surface preparation, conditioning and metrology steps such as wafer cleaning, plasma activation alignment verification, debonding (allowing pre-bonded wafers to be separated automatically and re-processed if necessary) and thermo-compression bonding.

EVG will showcase the GEMINI FB XT at the SEMICON Europa exhibition being held November 14-17 at the Messe München in Munich, Germany. Attendees interested in learning more about the product, as well as EVG’s full suite of wafer bonding and lithography solutions, are invited to visit the company’s booth #B1-1424.

U.S. semiconductor chemical suppliers lost market share to Japanese and European competitors in every major segment over the past decade, according to the report entitled “Chemicals and Materials for Sub-100 nm IC Manufacturing,” recently published by The Information Network (www.theinformationnet.com), a New Tripoli, PA-based market research company.

“Despite a shift in semiconductor manufacturing from the U.S. to Japan, to Korea, and then to China, the chemical supply chain is still dominated by U.S., Japanese, and European chemical companies,” noted Dr. Robert Castellano, president of The Information Network.

Within this supply chain, U.S. chemical manufacturers lost market share in every major chemical sector over the past decade, according to The Information Network’s report. Specific details for the top three suppliers in each of the sectors are listed in the table below:

chemicals

 

The first sector is one of the more interesting, because GlobalWafers, a Taiwanese company, acquired SunEdison in late 2016 making it the first company to break into the top three that wasn’t from headquartered in the U.S., Japan, or Europe,” added Dr. Castellano.

According to the report, the company held a 13.5% share in 2004 (when it was called MEMC) but it dropped to 10.1% in 2016 (when it was called SunEdison).

In each of the other sectors, the U.S. company dropped in market share. In the liquid chemicals sector, KMG Chemicals dropped from first place to third place, but gained market share because of its acquisition of OM Chemicals in 2014.

SEMICON Europa is quickly approaching on 14-17 November.  As the premier platform in Europe for discovering new technologies, finding solutions to electronics design and manufacturing challenges, and meeting the people and companies who are advancing electronics innovation, SEMICON Europa features over 60 presentations covering the entire electronics manufacturing supply chain.

BOSCH-300

SEMI interviewed one of the four keynotes presenting on November 14 during the Opening Ceremony, Dr. Stefan Finkbeiner, CEO of Bosch Sensortec, about topics about developments and trends in IoT, Environmental Sensing, and Value Chain as well as the role of Europe.

SEMI:  IoT growth is slower than expected. Possible reasons are relatively high costs and lack of silicon integration and interoperable standards. However, expected progress over the next two years on all those fronts will fuel a market that “will very quickly double” its shipment rates. What do you see as key factors for a success of IoT solutions and what are today’s roadblocks?

Finkbeiner: Today, the IoT market is fragmented. The lack of standardization is limiting the implementation of new solutions, and only a cooperation of different competencies will bring us closer to a better result. Key success factors for doing so are customization, standardization and cooperation between different parties along the ecosystems and the value chain: all those elements will contribute to the progress of the IoT. In the end, it is the use case that really counts. If you have to pay for a solution, you will only do so if you are sure you will really benefit from it.  Some applications, which are already in the market, include the possibility of detecting the indoor air quality. When and where shall I open the window to get fresh air in order to improve the work environment? If a room is empty, there is no need to use the sensors to heat up or cool down. We can calculate the benefits – and those in charge of operation can measure how much it pays off.

SEMI:  Which role does the cooperation along the value chain play here?

Finkbeiner:  Cooperation is the key, and when we talk about the value chain, there are different competencies, e.g. hardware, software and collaboration with partners to generate smart sensors. These smart sensors accumulate and evaluate sensor signals and dates. Only valuable data is transferred via gateways into a cloud. It is not only about “making the value chain happen,” but also about having access to the market. No company on its own is able to access all markets, but with a net of partners we can. It is crucial to combine competencies in order to get access to the IoT market and accelerate penetration in different applications.

SEMI:  Smart buildings represent the second largest target of the IoT market. This is followed by connected vehicles and smart farms at about a billion devices each. Let’s take the automotive industry and major changes of today’s new players such as Tesla, Google or Uber entering the market. Do you expect or see already similar trends for in the field of Smart buildings or Smart Cities?

Finkbeiner: If we talk about environmental sensing, the answer will be “no.” Still, companies with competencies in the field of sensors or microcontrollers are the ones providing sensor solutions. However, if you talk about making use out of the data, companies like Google, Apple, or Amazon, will also be involved in the IoT market’s data business.

SEMI:   What are typical examples of Environmental Sensing you are referring to?

Finkbeiner: A typical example of environmental sensing is measuring the indoor air quality for energy management in a smart home or smart factory. Let´s take, for example, a fitness application: you can use an app to measure the humidity rate and the air quality. If the results do not show favorable conditions for doing sports, you will most probably decide not to exercise in that specific area, or during a specific time, or period. One of the first products on the market is a smart case for the smartphone developed by i-BLADES, which turns into a portable air quality monitor, thanks to the integrated gas sensor BME680. We currently see many such smart applications emerging on the market.  But there are also other applications: let´s take, for example, food watching. If food is aging, our sensor can recognize it – and an app can show it on your smart phone.

SEMI: The solutions available on the market are very fragmented today and adopting various often-interoperable standards. How do you think it will evolve?

Finkbeiner: There are applications with more obvious benefits than others. The best practices should be leveraged to develop standards. In fact, nobody wants to work with three or four different ecosystems and thus more standardization will be required. For instance, to run applications coming from different companies with just one app is a must. As soon as applications will grow, the standardization will grow, too. The growing number of applications increasingly drives up the number of use cases and as a result, more standardization will occur. It is a slow process, but it is indeed happening.

SEMI:  Bosch invested in a new 300mm Fab in Dresden, which is the biggest single investment in Bosch’s 130-year history. The fab will satisfy the demand generated by the growing number of internet of things (IoT) and mobility applications; the new location should manufacture chips on the basis of 12-inch wafers.  Bosch is one of the largest players in Dresden. This new investment is marking a big step: how important is it for you, as a global player, to belong to such an important innovation hub in Europe?

Finkbeiner: For Bosch, it is essential to be part of this microelectronics cluster in Dresden and to utilize the synergies around it. For the semiconductor industry, it is important to leverage the synergies of the different players in Dresden. Beyond this, if we talk about ecosystems for IoT applications and collaborations, it is also important to go to innovation hubs driving IoT products and solutions such as Berlin, Singapore and other places with a rich start-up ecosystem. Furthermore, a global footprint is also very important: a worldwide IoT community and a larger ecosystem, a connection with America and Asia. But then again: Europe is a very good place to be! In Europe, all competencies to make the IoT applications happen are available.

SEMI:   Which key areas will enhance the cooperation within innovation hubs across different innovation hubs in Europe?

Finkbeiner: When talking about hardware, Dresden comes into play. Dresden certainly brings the necessary competencies, for instance with universities and industry collaboration. Think about Silicon Saxony in Dresden or clusters around the Stuttgart region in Baden-Wurttemberg. Also presence on global hubs and markets, such as Silicon Valley in the U.S. West Coast or Shanghai in China, are important.

SEMI:  What do you expect from SEMICON Europa 2017 and why do you recommend attending in Munich?

Finkbeiner: SEMICON Europa is a very important platform for us. It is an opportunity to meet partners, customers, industry leaders, to exchange ideas and to get new insights. In addition, together with Stuttgart and Dresden, the Munich region as a location of significant electronics companies and technical universities is particularly important for us. We, at Bosch Sensortec also have a development site in Munich.

A transfer technique based on thin sacrificial layers of boron nitride could allow high-performance gallium nitride gas sensors to be grown on sapphire substrates and then transferred to metallic or flexible polymer support materials. The technique could facilitate the production of low-cost wearable, mobile and disposable sensing devices for a wide range of environmental applications.

Transferring the gallium nitride sensors to metallic foils and flexible polymers doubles their sensitivity to nitrogen dioxide gas, and boosts response time by a factor of six. The simple production steps, based on metal organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE), could also lower the cost of producing the sensors and other optoelectronic devices.

Sensors produced with the new process can detect ammonia at parts-per-billion levels and differentiate between nitrogen-containing gases. The gas sensor fabrication technique was reported November 9 in the journal Scientific Reports.

Abdallah Ougazzaden, director of Georgia Tech Lorraine in Metz, France and Chris Bishop, a researcher at Institut Lafayette, example a sample being processed in a lab at Georgia Tech Lorraine. (Credit: Rob Felt, Georgia Tech).

Abdallah Ougazzaden, director of Georgia Tech Lorraine in Metz, France and Chris Bishop, a researcher at Institut Lafayette, example a sample being processed in a lab at Georgia Tech Lorraine. (Credit: Rob Felt, Georgia Tech).

“Mechanically, we just peel the devices off the substrate, like peeling the layers of an onion,” explained Abdallah Ougazzaden, director of Georgia Tech Lorraine in Metz, France and a professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE). “We can put the layer on another support that could be flexible, metallic or plastic. This technique really opens up a lot of opportunity for new functionality, new devices – and commercializing them.”

The researchers begin the process by growing monolayers of boron nitride on two-inch sapphire wafers using an MOVPE process at approximately 1,300 degrees Celsius. The boron nitride surface coating is only a few nanometers thick, and produces crystalline structures that have strong planar surface connections, but weak vertical connections.

Image shows wafer-scale processed AlGaN/GaN sensors being tested. (Credit: Georgia Tech Lorraine).

Image shows wafer-scale processed AlGaN/GaN sensors being tested. (Credit: Georgia Tech Lorraine).

Aluminum gallium nitride (AlGaN/GaN) devices are then grown atop the monolayers at a temperature of about 1,100 degrees Celsius, also using an MOVPE process. Because of the boron nitride crystalline properties, the devices are attached to the substrate only by weak Van der Waals forces, which can be overcome mechanically. The devices can be transferred to other substrates without inducing cracks or other defects. The sapphire wafers can be reused for additional device growth.

“This approach for engineering GaN-based sensors is a key step in the pathway towards economically viable, flexible sensors with improved performances that could be integrated into wearable applications,” the authors wrote in their paper.

So far, the researchers have transferred the sensors to copper foil, aluminum foil and polymeric materials. In operation, the devices can differentiate between nitrogen oxide, nitrogen dioxide, and ammonia. Because the devices are approximately 100 by 100 microns, sensors for multiple gases can be produced on a single integrated device.

“Not only can we differentiate between these gases, but because the sensor is very small, we can detect them all at the same time with an array of sensors,” said Ougazzaden, who expects that the devices could be modified to also detect ozone, carbon dioxide and other gases.

The gallium nitride sensors could have a wide range of applications from industry to vehicle engines – and for wearable sensing devices. The devices are attractive because of their advantageous materials properties, which include high thermal and chemical stability.

“The devices are small and flexible, which will allow us to put them onto many different types of support,” said Ougazzaden, who also directs the International Joint Research Lab at Georgia Tech CNRS.

To assess the effects of transferring the devices to a different substrate, the researchers measured device performance on the original sapphire wafer and compared that to performance on the new metallic and polymer substrates. They were surprised to see a doubling of the sensor sensitivity and a six-fold increase in response time, changes beyond what could be expected by a simple thermal change in the devices.

“Not only can we have flexibility in the substrate, but we can also improve the performance of the devices just by moving them to a different support with appropriate properties,” he said. “Properties of the substrate alone makes the different in the performance.”

In future work, the researchers hope to boost the quality of the devices and demonstrate other sensing applications. “One of the challenges ahead is to improve the quality of the materials so we can extend this to other applications that are very sensitive to the substrates, such as high-performance electronics.”

The Georgia Tech researchers have previously used a similar technique to produce light-emitting diodes and ultraviolet detectors that were transferred to different substrates, and they believe the process could also be used to produce high-power electronics. For those applications, transferring the devices from sapphire to substrates with better thermal conductivity could provide a significant advantage in device operation.

Ougazzaden and his research team have been working on boron-based semiconductors since 2005. Their work has attracted visits from several industrial companies interested in exploring the technology, he said.

“I am very excited and lucky to work on such hot topic and top-notch technology at GT-Lorraine,” said Taha Ayari, a Ph.D. student in the Georgia Tech School of ECE and the paper’s first author.

In addition to Ougazzaden, the research team includes Georgia Tech Ph.D. students Taha Ayari, Matthew Jordan, Xin Li and Saiful Alam; Chris Bishop and Youssef ElGmili, researchers at Institut Lafayette; Suresh Sundaram, a researcher at Georgia Tech Lorraine; Gilles Patriarche, a researcher at the Centre de Nanosciences et de Nanotechnologies (C2N) at CNRS; Paul Voss, an associate professor in the Georgia Tech School of ECE; and Jean Paul Salvestrini, a professor at Georgia Tech Lorraine and adjunct professor in the Georgia Tech School of ECE.

The research was supported by ANR (Agence Nationale de Recherche), the National Agency of Research in France through the “GANEX” Project.

CITATION: Taha Ayari, et al., “Gas sensors boosted by two-dimensional h-BN enabled transfer on thin substrate foils: towards wearable and portable applications,” (Scientific Reports, 2017). http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-15065-6

The trick is to be able to use beryllium atoms in gallium nitride. Gallium nitride is a compound widely used in semiconductors in consumer electronics from LED lights to game consoles. To be useful in devices that need to process considerably more energy than in your everyday home entertainment, though, gallium nitride needs to be manipulated in new ways on the atomic level.

“There is growing demand for semiconducting gallium nitride in the power electronics industry. To make electronic devices that can process the amounts of power required in, say, electric cars, we need structures based on large-area semi-insulating semiconductors with properties that allow minimising power loss and can dissipate heat efficiently. To achieve this, adding beryllium into gallium nitride – or ‘doping’ it – shows great promise,” explains Professor Filip Tuomisto from Aalto University.

Sample chamber of the positron accelerator. Credit: Hanna Koikkalainen

Sample chamber of the positron accelerator. Credit: Hanna Koikkalainen

Experiments with beryllium doping were conducted in the late 1990s in the hope that beryllium would prove more efficient as a doping agent than the prevailing magnesium used in LED lights. The work proved unsuccessful, however, and research on beryllium was largely discarded.

Working with scientists in Texas and Warsaw, researchers at Aalto University have now managed to show – thanks to advances in computer modelling and experimental techniques – that beryllium can actually perform useful functions in gallium nitride. The article published in Physical Review Letters shows that depending on whether the material is heated or cooled, beryllium atoms will switch positions, changing their nature of either donating or accepting electrons. “Our results provide valuable knowledge for experimental scientists about the fundamentals of how beryllium changes its behaviour during the manufacturing process. During it – while being subjected to high temperatures – the doped compound functions very differently than the end result,” describes Tuomisto.

If the beryllium-doped gallium nitride structures and their electronic properties can be fully controlled, power electronics could move to a whole new realm of energy efficiency.

“The magnitude of the change in energy efficiency could as be similar as when we moved to LED lights from traditional incandescent light bulbs. It could be possible to cut down the global power consumption by up to ten per cent by cutting the energy losses in power distribution systems,” says Tuomisto.

The Global Semiconductor Alliance (GSA) today announced the 2017 award nominees for the GSA Awards Dinner Celebration. Featuring a new Master of Ceremonies format hosted by Wayne Brady, five-time Emmy winner and Grammy nominee, the celebration will take place on Thursday, December 7, 2017, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, California. The program will recognize companies that have demonstrated excellence through their vision, strategy, execution and future opportunity. These companies will be honored for their achievements in several categories ranging from outstanding leadership to financial accomplishments, as well as overall respect within the industry.

The 2017 Dr. Morris Chang Exemplary Leadership Award winner is Ray Stata, Cofounder and Chairman of Analog Devices, Inc.

The evening’s program will recognize leading semiconductor companies that have exhibited market growth through technological innovation and exceptional business management strategies. The award categories and nominees (in alphabetical order) are as follows:

View Nominee Announcement Video

Start-Up to Watch Award

  • DecaWave Ltd.
  • Innovium, Inc.
  • SiFive, Inc.

Most Respected Private Semiconductor Company Award

  • Aquantia Corporation
  • Luxtera, Inc.
  • Montage Technology
  • Silego Technology, Inc.

Most Respected Emerging Public Semiconductor Company Award (Achieving $100 Million to $500 Million in Annual Sales):

  • Monolithic Power Systems, Inc. (MPS)
  • Parade Technologies, Ltd.
  • Power Integrations, Inc.

Most Respected Public Semiconductor Company Award (Achieving $500 Million to $1 Billion in Annual Sales):

  • ams AG
  • Shenzhen Goodix Technology Co., Ltd.
  • Silicon Labs

Most Respected Public Semiconductor Company Award (Achieving $1 Billion to $5 Billion in Annual Sales)

  • Analog Devices, Inc.
  • Dialog Semiconductor
  • Xilinx, Inc.

Most Respected Public Semiconductor Company Award (Achieving Greater than $5 Billion in Annual Sales)

  • Infineon Technologies AG
  • NVIDIA Corporation
  • NXP Semiconductors N.V.

Best Financially Managed Semiconductor Company Award (Achieving Up to $1 Billion in Annual Sales):

  • Parade Technologies, Ltd.
  • Silicon Labs
  • Silicon Motion Technology Corporation (Silicon Motion, Inc.)

Best Financially Managed Semiconductor Company Award (Achieving Greater than $1 Billion in Annual Sales)

  • Maxim Integrated
  • SK Hynix Inc.
  • Skyworks Solutions, Inc.

Analyst Favorite Semiconductor Company Award (chosen by analyst Rajvindra Gill of Needham & Company, LLC)

  • Microchip Technology Inc.
  • Micron Technology, Inc.
  • NVIDIA Corporation

Outstanding Asia Pacific Semiconductor Company Award

  • MediaTek Inc.
  • Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
  • Spreadtrum Communications

Outstanding EMEA Semiconductor Company Award

  • Graphcore
  • Infineon Technologies AG
  • STMicroelectronics
  • Valens

 

Leti announced today that a team of its researchers is participating in a U.S.-funded project to develop a safe, implantable neural interface system to restore vision by stimulating the visual cortex.

Funded by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Neural Engineering System Design program (NESD) sets out to expand neurotechnology capabilities and provide a foundation for future treatments of sensory deficits.

Scientists from Leti and Clinatec, Leti’s biomedical research center focused on applying micro- and nanotechnology innovations to health care, are part of a consortium conducted by the Paris Vision Institute under the leadership of Prof. José-Alain Sahel and Dr. Serge Picaud. The Vision Institute is a leading European research center in eye diseases, and is part of the Seeing and Hearing Foundation (Fondation Voir et Entendre, FVE), which was awarded the DARPA grant.

The FVE team project, called CorticalSight, is part of the six projects selected by DARPA to participate in the groundbreaking NESD program. CorticalSight will apply techniques from the field of optogenetics to enable communication between neurons in the visual cortex and a camera-based, high-definition artificial retina worn over the eyes. Leti will lead the development of the active implantable medical device that will interface with the visual cortex.

Clinatec and its Leti partners will focus on developing a safe, wireless, implantable system that restores vision through light stimulation of optogenetically modified neurons in the visual cortex. Leti is tasked with designing an implantable device, as well as creating hermetic packaging and radiofrequency links for the implantable system, and subsequently conducting technical test benches. The Leti implant will enable visual cortex optical-stimulation patterns, and integrate the underlying control electronics within a minimally invasive cortical implant.

“Clinatec’s integrated approach to high-tech, medical-device R&D, extending from Leti’s technological development to in-house clinical expertise and testing capabilities, allows our teams to address cutting-edge medtech development challenges,” said Prof. Alim-Louis Benabid, Clinatec’s chairman of the board, and co-investigator of the CorticalSight project. “This contribution to the CorticalSight consortium will pave the way to new therapeutic devices for vision restoration thanks to the NESD program.”

Partners of the CorticalSight project also include the French companies Chronocam and Gensight®, Stanford University, Inscopix and the Friedrich Miescher Institute of Switzerland.

Researchers have developed a technique that allows users to collect 100 times more spectrographic information per day from microfluidic devices, as compared to the previous industry standard. The novel technology has already led to a new discovery: the speed of mixing ingredients for quantum dots used in LEDs changes the color of light they emit – even when all other variables are identical.

Researchers have discovered that the speed of mixing ingredients for quantum dots used in LEDs changes the color of light they emit -- even when all other variables are identical. Credit: Milad Abolhasani

Researchers have discovered that the speed of mixing ingredients for quantum dots used in LEDs changes the color of light they emit — even when all other variables are identical. Credit: Milad Abolhasani

“Semiconductor nanocrystals are important structures used in a variety of applications, ranging from LED displays to solar cells. But producing nanocrystalline structures using chemical synthesis is tricky, because what works well on a small scale can’t be directly scaled up – the physics don’t work,” says Milad Abolhasani, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at North Carolina State University and corresponding author of a paper on the work.

“This challenge has led to an interest in continuous nanomanufacturing approaches that rely on precisely controlled microfluidic-based synthesis,” Abolhasani says. “But testing all of the relevant variables to find the best combination for manufacturing a given structure takes an extremely long time due to the limitations of the existing monitoring technologies – so we decided to build a completely new platform.”

Currently, microfluidic monitoring technologies are fixed in place, and monitor either absorption or fluorescence. Fluorescence data tells you what the crystal’s emission bandgap is – or what color of light it emits – which is important for LED applications. Absorption data tells you the crystal’s size and concentration, which is relevant for all applications, as well as its absorption bandgap – which is important for solar cell applications.

To monitor both fluorescence and absorption you’d need two separate monitoring points. And, being fixed in place, people would speed up or slow down the flow rate in the microfluidic channel to control the reaction time of the chemical synthesis: the faster the flow rate, the less reaction time a sample has before it hits the monitoring point. Working around the clock, this approach would allow a lab to collect about 300 data samples in 24 hours.

Abolhasani and his team developed an automated microfluidic technology called NanoRobo, in which a spectrographic monitoring module that collects both fluorescent and absorption data can move along the microfluidic channel, collecting data along the way. The system is capable of collecting 30,000 data samples in 24 hours – expediting the discovery, screening, and optimization of colloidal semiconductor nanocrystals, such as perovskite quantum dots, by two orders of magnitude. Video of the automated system can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBQoSDdn_Uk.

And, because of the translational capability of the novel monitoring module, the system can study reaction time by moving along the microfluidic channel, rather than changing the flow rate – which, the researchers discovered, makes a big difference.

Because NanoRobo allowed researchers to monitor reaction time and flow rate as separate variables for the first time, Abolhasani was the first to note that the velocity of the samples in the microfluidic channel affected the size and emission color of the resulting nanocrystals. Even if all the ingredients were the same, and all of the other conditions were identical, samples that moved – and mixed – at a faster rate produced smaller nanocrystals. And that affects the color of light those crystals emit.

“This is just one more way to tune the emission wavelength of perovskite nanocrystals for use in LED devices,” Abolhasani says.

NC State has filed a provisional patent covering NanoRobo and is open to exploring potential market applications for the technology.

Alpha and Omega Semiconductor Limited (AOS) (Nasdaq:AOSL) a designer, developer and global supplier of a broad range of power semiconductors and power ICs, today announced the release of AONS66916 production utilizing the latest Alpha Shield Gate Technology Generation 2 (AlphaSGT2). The AONS66916 has RDS(ON) * Qg  (FOM) and more robust capability for a greater safety margin. In synchronous rectification, it is essential to optimize the reverse recovery charge and reduce the voltage overshoot. These attributes enable higher efficiency and robustness to critical high density telecom and server applications.

The AlphaSGT2 provides ~30% lower RDS(ON) compared to AlphaSGT1 and is designed to be more robust with significant avalanche energy improvement. AlphaSGT2 technology reduces both conduction and switching losses. Thus, with AlphaSGT2 technology, circuit designers can prevent paralleling devices for lower turn-on resistance, enabling higher power density in power supply applications.

“The new AlphaSGT2 100V technology is designed for critical applications such as Telecom and Datacom power supplies where power density, high efficiency, and robustness is essential,” said Peter H. Wilson, Director of Product Marketing at AOS.

Technical Highlights

Part Number VDS (V) VGS (V) RDS(ON)MAX (mOhms) Qg (typ) (nC) ID @ TA = 25°C (A)
@ 10V
AONS66916 100 ±20 3.6 67 100

The AONS66916 is immediately available in production quantities with a lead-time of 15 weeks. The unit price of 1,000 pieces is $ 1.2.

Alpha and Omega Semiconductor Limited, or AOS, is a designer, developer and global supplier of a broad range of power semiconductors, including a wide portfolio of Power MOSFET, IGBT, IPM and Power IC products.