12/02/2003 (December 1, 2003) San Jose, Calif.—Worldwide sales of semiconductors rose to $15.4 billion in October 2003, a 6.8 percent increase from the $14.4 billion recorded in September, and a 23.3 percent rise from October of 2002. With the October 2003 gain, the strongest since 1990, industry revenue has grown 16.4 percent in the year to date, reports the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).
12/01/2003 DEC. 1--ROCKVILLE, Md.--The Center for Science in the Public Interest says the rising number of produce-related illnesses, including a hepatitis A outbreak last month at a Chi-Chi's Mexican restaurant, suggests problems with the Food and Drug Administration's ability to regulate growers.
12/01/2003 DEC. 1--ALBANY, N.Y.--The University at Albany's latest building project, the NanoFab 300N is likely the most robust for miles around, says Tom Yurkewecz, UAlbany's director of programs, who is responsible for overseeing its construction.
12/01/2003 The results of a project funded by a $1.2 million federal defense grant could send a clear signal to developers of next-generation military and commercial communication systems. A University of California, Irvine, professor is working on light and low-cost antennas based on radio frequency (RF) MEMS. Such technology could provide satellite TV in a car, and eventually, laptops.
12/01/2003 The global nanotechnology market is expected to grow to $18 billion by 2005, with nano-enabled flat-panel displays and fuel cells expected to launch within three years, according to a survey reported in Asia Pulse.
12/01/2003 Tom Mehl is trying to sell his house, but finding a buyer has been tough for the simple reason that he lives in the "area of vapor contamination" created by plume that is emanating from a nearby IBM Corp. plant.
12/01/2003 Countless manufacturing jobs are continually lost to China, where salaries pale in comparison to those of American workers. And while that alarms many in the United States, the shift by life sciences, chip and microelectronics companies to Asia Pacific is not likely to end anytime soon.
12/01/2003 Interaction between parenteral drug products and the packaging continues to be a critical issue, especially since validation and risk-based approaches are top priorities on the Food and Drug Administration's agenda for current good manufacturing practices (cGMPs).
12/01/2003 For a high-profile industry that gets its share of criticism on the environmental health and safety (EH&S) front, the semiconductor community has, for the past 12 years, operated under a self-imposed safety standard called SEMI S2.
12/01/2003 The semiconductor industry is no stranger to severe allegations and drawn out legal battles concerning the issue of environmental health and safety (EH&S). These concerns have followed the industry since its inception and will continue to ride its heels as long as the use of chemicals and gases are core to success.
12/01/2003 The other day, I had the dubious pleasure of sitting across the table from the owner of a newly built contamination-controlled life sciences facility. The pleasure was dubious because the critical laboratories of this facility have remained empty and unused ever since construction ended. The litany of problems listed by the owner seemed endless.
12/01/2003 E-mail, interactive Web sites and instant messaging have forever changed the way we communicate; and in turn, these pervasive media have changed the landscape of technical conference design forever.
12/01/2003 Newspaper headlines read healthcare costs are out of control while Americans are asking how drug companies can sell drugs cheaper outside the United States.
12/01/2003 Back in September, we examined how filters work and learned to recite the filtration mantra of interception, impaction and diffusion. We illustrated that particle removal by interception occurs when a section of a particle "runs into" a filter fiber and "sticks"—or, in the special case of sieving, where a particle is too large to fit between two adjacent fibers and "runs into" both.
12/01/2003 The case against Armonk, N.Y.-based IBM Corp. and various chemical manufacturers finally got underway in early November after some difficulty in empanelling an impartial jury.
