Category Archives: MEMS

By Walt Custer, Custer Consulting Group

Broad global & U.S. electronic supply chain growth

The first quarter of this year was very strong globally, with growth across the entire electronics supply chain. Although Chart 1 is based on preliminary data, every electronics sector expanded –  with many in double digits. The U.S. dollar-denominated growth estimates in Chart 1 have effectively been amplified by about 5 percent by exchange rates (as stronger non-dollar currencies were consolidated to weaker U.S. dollars), but the first quarter global rates are very impressive nonetheless.

Walt Custer Chart 1

U.S. growth was also good (Chart 2) with Quarter 1 2018 total electronics equipment shipments up 7.2 percent over the same period last year. Since all the Chart 2 values are based on domestic (US$) sales, there is no growth amplification due to exchange rates.

Walt Custer Chart 2

We expect continued growth in Quarter 2 but not at the robust pace as the first quarter.

Chip foundry growth resumes

Taiwan-listed companies report their monthly revenues on a timely basis – about 10 days after month end. We track a composite of 14 Taiwan Stock Exchange listed chip foundries to maintain a “pulse” of this industry (Chart 3).

Walt Custer Chart 3

Chip foundry sales have been a leading indicator for global semiconductor and semiconductor capital equipment shipments. After dropping to near zero in mid-2017, foundry growth is now rebounding.

Chart 4 compares 3/12 (3-month) growth rates of global semiconductor and semiconductor equipment sales to chip foundry sales. The foundry 3/12 has historically led semiconductors and SEMI equipment and is pointing to a coming cyclical upturn. It will be interesting to see how China’s semiconductor industry buildup impacts this historical foundry leading indicator’s performance.

Walt Custer Chart 4

Passive Component Shortages and Price Increases

Passive component availability and pricing are currently major issues. Per Chart 5, Quarter 1 2018 passive component revenues increased almost 25 percent over the same period last year. Inadequate component supplies are hampering many board assemblers with no short-term relief in sight.

Walt Custer Chart 5

Peeking into the Future

Looking forward, the global purchasing managers index (a broad leading indicator) has moderated but is still well in growth territory.

Walt Custer Chart 6

The world business outlook remains positive but requires continuous watching!

Walt Custer of Custer Consulting Group is an  analyst focused on the global electronics industry.

Originally published on the SEMI blog.

For the 20th year, a worldwide survey of semiconductor manufacturers has resulted in Plasma-Therm winning multiple awards for its systems and superior customer service.

In the annual Customer Satisfaction Survey conducted by VLSIresearch, Plasma-Therm earned a total of five awards, including two “RANKED 1st” awards. Plasma-Therm earned the highest scores of all companies in two award categories, “Etch & Clean Equipment” and “Focused Suppliers of Chip Making Equipment.”

Survey participants are asked to rate semiconductor equipment suppliers in 15 categories based on supplier performance, customer service, and product performance.

“The achievement of two ‘RANKED 1st’ awards and five awards overall is very gratifying” Plasma-Therm CEO Abdul Lateef said. “While we continue to expand our product and application portfolio, we never lose our focus on providing the best service and support. We are working harder than ever to ensure success for all our customers, from small institutions and start-ups to specialty fabs and high-volume manufacturers.”

In THE BEST Suppliers of Fab Equipment, which includes specialized manufacturers like Plasma-Therm as well as the world’s largest equipment makers, Plasma-Therm ranked higher than every other company besides ASML, the world’s largest maker photolithography supplier. Plasma-Therm also was ranked higher than all other suppliers besides ASML in THE BEST Suppliers of Fab Equipment to Specialty Chip Makers.

With this year’s awards, Plasma-Therm now has received a total of 42 awards over 20 years of participation in the Customer Satisfaction Survey. VLSIresearch received feedback from more than 94 percent of the chip market in this year’s survey, which was conducted over 2-1/2 months and in five languages. Here is the full list of awards earned by Plasma-Therm in the 2018 Customer Satisfaction Survey:

• RANKED 1st in FOCUSED SUPPLIERS OF CHIP MAKINGEQUIPMENT • RANKED 1st in ETCH & CLEAN EQUIPMENT
• 10 BEST FOCUSED SUPPLIERS OF CHIP MAKING EQUIPMENT
• THE BEST SUPPLIERS OF FAB EQUIPMENT

• THE BEST SUPPLIERS OF FAB EQUIPMENT TO SPECIALTY CHIP MAKERS About Plasma-Therm

Established in 1974, Plasma-Therm is a manufacturer of advanced plasma processing equipment for specialty semiconductor markets, including advanced packaging, wireless communication, photonics, solid-state lighting, MEMS/NEMS, nanotechnology, renewable energy, data storage, photomask, and R&D. Plasma-Therm offers etch and deposition technologies and solutions for these markets.

SiTime Corporation announced it has expanded its global footprint to support its rapid growth with the opening of a new Center of Excellence in Michigan.

“SiTime’s mission is to solve the most difficult timing challenges for our customers,” said Rajesh Vashist, CEO of SiTime. “To fulfil our mission, SiTime’s strategy is to deliver leading-edge solutions by employing the best talent in communities that offer the highest quality of life. Our Michigan Center is near many world-class universities. The rich talent pool in the region, especially in engineering, will help us accelerate our product development. Additionally, Michigan is at the forefront of connected and autonomous vehicle innovation, which is of strategic importance to SiTime. Our proximity and collaborative cooperation with the industry will extend our leadership in automotive timing solutions. We look forward to SiTime Michigan becoming a key contributor to our success.”

By combining unique MEMS and analog technology with a fabless semiconductor model and significant knowhow, SiTime has transformed the timing industry over the past decade. Today, SiTime sets the benchmark in performance, reliability, size, and flexibility, and is the preferred timing supplier for high-performance electronics. SiTime has cumulatively shipped 1 billion units since 2005 and has 90% share of the MEMS timing market. To support this rapid global growth and fuel innovation, SiTime has a significant presence worldwide, including China, Japan, the Netherlands, Russia, Taiwan, and Ukraine.

In Michigan, to assist with office space location, new talent acquisition, and business support services, SiTime collaborated with Ann Arbor SPARK, a non-profit economic development organization.

“The Ann Arbor region is a unique place where business intersects with advanced research, out-of-the-box thinkers, abundant financial resources, vibrant economic development and an immense talent pool,” said Paul Krutko, president/CEO, Ann Arbor SPARK. “We are thrilled to work with SiTime to help them get settled and to find the talent that will fuel their continued growth, while further energizing our technology sector.”

Pure quartz glass is highly transparent and resistant to thermal, physical, and chemical impacts. These are optimum prerequisites for use in optics, data technology or medical engineering. For efficient, high-quality machining, however, adequate processes are lacking. Scientists of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have developed a forming technology to structure quartz glass like a polymer. This innovation is reported in the journal Advanced Materials.

“It has always been a big challenge to combine highly pure quartz glass and its excellent properties with a simple structuring technology,” says Dr. Bastian E. Rapp, Head of the NeptunLab interdisciplinary research group of KIT’s Institute of Microstructure Technology (IMT). Rapp and his team develop new processes for industrial glass processing. “Instead of heating glass up to 800 °C for forming or structuring parts of glass blocks by laser processing or etching, we start with the smallest glass particles,” says the mechanical engineer. The scientists mix glass particles of 40 nanometers in size with a liquid polymer, form the mix like a sponge cake, and harden it to a solid by heating or light exposure. The resulting solid consists of glass particles in a matrix at a ratio of 60 to 40 vol%. The polymers act like a bonding agent that retains the glass particles at the right locations and, hence, maintains the shape.

This “Glassomer” can be milled, turned, laser-machined or processed in CNC machines just like a conventional polymer. “The entire range of polymer forming technologies is now opened for glass,” Rapp emphasizes. For fabricating high-performance lenses that are used in smartphones among others, the scientists produce a Glassomer rod, from which the lenses are cut. For highly pure quartz glass, the polymers in the composite have to be removed. For doing so, the lenses are heated in a furnace at 500 to 600 °C and the polymer is burned fully to CO2. To close the resulting gaps in the material, the lenses are sintered at 1300 °C. During this process, the remaining glass particles are densified to pore-free glass.

This forming technology enables production of highly pure glass materials for any applications, for which only polymers have been suited so far. This opens up new opportunities for the glass processing industry as well as for the optical industry, microelectronics, biotechnology, and medical engineering. “Our process is suited for mass production. Production and use of quartz glass are much cheaper, more sustainable, and more energy-efficient than those of a special polymer,” Rapp explains.

This is the third innovation for the processing of quartz glass that has been developed by NeptunLab on the basis of a liquid glass-polymer mixture. In 2016, the scientists already succeeded in using this mixture for molding. In 2017, they applied the mixture for 3D printing and demonstrate its suitability for additive manufacture. Within the framework of the “NanomatFutur” competition for early-stage researchers, the team was funded with EUR 2.8 million by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research from 2014 to 2018. A spinoff now plans to commercialize Glassomer.

By Emir Demircan

SEMI Position on the European Commission’s Proposal for a Regulation Establishing a Framework for Screening Foreign Direct Investments into the European Union

In response to the European Commission’s (EC) proposed framework for screening foreign direct investments (FDI), SEMI, representing the global electronics manufacturing supply chain, offers three recommendations for consideration by EU policymakers:

To support the sophisticated global ecosystem of semiconductor manufacturers, the EU should remain open to global investment. More efforts should be made to form trade and investment agreements that support European businesses’ access to foreign markets.

The global micro- and nano-electronics (MNE) industry consists of organizations specializing in research, design, equipment, materials, semiconductor manufacturing, assembly and applications – a complex global ecosystem that contributes 2 trillion USD (SEMI data) to the world economy. With its production of smaller, faster, more reliable products with higher performance, the MNE industry is one of the world’s most capital- and research-intensive sectors. Today, a state-of-the-art semiconductor manufacturing fab can easily cost billions of euros and might require international investment to deliver cutting-edge solutions.

Europe’s MNE industry plays a pivotal role in this global value chain through its investments in emerging technologies such as autonomous driving, smart healthcare, artificial intelligence and industrial automation. The region’s MNE industry features leading electronics manufacturing equipment and materials businesses, world-class research and development (R&D) and educational institutions, and vital semiconductor manufacturing hubs that are home to multinationals headquartered both inside and outside of the EU.

In the proposed framework, the EU recognizes that FDI is an important engine of economic growth, jobs and innovation. Its work to maintain a climate of open investment and connect European businesses with leading innovators and investors around the world has laid the groundwork for the success of European industrial technologies sector. These efforts have set an example for rich cross-border business relations even in the face of rising protectionist practices around the world.

The proposed EC regulation aims to establish an EU-level framework for exchanging information related to a broad range of technologies between the EC and Member States, and to assess, investigate, authorize, condition, prohibit, or unwind FDI in certain technologies on the grounds of security or public order. EU policymakers should bear in mind that a new EU-level FDI screening mechanism must be implemented very carefully. Stakeholders must clearly understand how FDI can pose a threat to security and public order in the EU.

Only transparent and precise definitions of FDI, security and public order and a limited scope of targeted technologies can provide the regulatory certainty for the EU to remain an attractive destination for foreign investors and European investees alike. On the contrary, unclear regulations could sow insecurity amongst potential investors, leading to delays or cancellation of much-needed investments and choking access to finance in capital-intensive sectors such as MNE.

MNE is a key enabling technology and advances in semiconductors enable market adoption of game-changing technologies such as artificial intelligence. The EU should ensure that future regulations do not cause lock-in effects or limit the growth of key technologies in Europe.

In the interest of security and public order, the proposed EU regulation permits Member States and the EC to screen FDI in critical infrastructure such as energy, transportation, communications and critical technologies including semiconductors, artificial intelligence and cybersecurity.  While it might be easier to screen critical infrastructure and the large-scale public services it provides for potential threats in security and public order, applying the same FDI filter to critical technologies can be extremely challenging.

Semiconductors are embedded in virtually all smart devices and systems including computers, mobile phones, cars, and aircraft. The ubiquity of chips raises the prospect that FDI in European smart technologies – and the supply chain that develops them – could be subject to screening. This level of regulatory oversight is likely to hamper not only EU’s competitiveness in key enabling technologies such as MNE but also ever-evolving applications including artificial intelligence. Also, the proposed screening framework calls for the assessment of FDI risks to security or public order by determining if an investor is controlled by foreign governments through “significant funding.” In the context of FDI, differentiating between state and private actors in other countries can be extremely challenging or even impossible, and the term “significant funding” is not clearly defined. Under this light, SEMI recommends:

  1. Defining a limited scope with clear conditions, explaining in quantitative and qualitative terms how FDI in key enabling technologies can threaten public order and security, and
  2. Introducing criteria that identifies whether an FDI leads to market distortions in Europe because a government investment program is not aligned with EU state-aid rules.

FDI is a powerful tool to support economic growth and competitiveness. Many Member States already screen FDI on the grounds of security and public order. Future regulations should ensure that additional screening neither duplicates national and EU-level assessments nor hampers Member States’ competitiveness.

Under the proposed regulation, the EC could screen FDI at the Union level. However, because many Member States already have detailed screening procedures in place to protect national security and public order, the draft regulation could increase red tape by duplicating administrative processes and regulations at the national and EU levels. Policymakers should keep in mind that FDI must in principle remain a national competence, with each Member State establishing its own national policy aimed at attracting FDI and supporting its economic growth. Many Member States compete to increase their share of EU FDI in key technologies that underpin national economic growth. Likewise, international investors already subject each Member State to their own investment criteria before making significant FDI decisions. Any proposed regulation that pushes Member States to share national-level FDI information could dilute successful FDI policies of some Member States and hamper the EU’s overall competitiveness.

Emir Demircan is Senior Manager Public Policy at SEMI Europe. Contact Emir at [email protected] , 0032484903114. 

Originally published on the SEMI blog.

The future of electronic devices lies partly within the “internet of things” – the network of devices, vehicles and appliances embedded within electronics to enable connectivity and data exchange. University of Illinois engineers are helping realize this future by minimizing the size of one notoriously large element of integrated circuits used for wireless communication – the transformer.

Three-dimensional rolled-up radio frequency transformers take 10 to 100 times less space, perform better when the power transfer ratio increases and have a simpler fabrication process than their 2-D progenitors, according to a paper detailing their design and performance in the journal Nature Electronics.

“Transformers are one of the largest and heaviest elements on any circuit board,” said principal investigator Xiuling Li, a professor of electrical and computer engineering. “When you pick up an LED light bulb, it feels heavy for its size and that is in part because of the bulky transformer inside. The size of these transformers may become a key obstacle to overcome in the future for wireless communication and IoT.”

Transformers use coiled wires to convert input signals to specific output signals for use in devices like microchips. Previous researchers have developed some radio frequency transformers using a stacked conducting material to solve the space problem, but these have limited performance potential. This limited performance is due to inefficient magnetic coupling between coils when they have a high turns ratio, meaning that the primary coil is much longer than the secondary coil, or vice versa, Li said. These stacked transformers need to be made using special materials and are difficult to fabricate, bulky and unbendable – things that are far from ideal for internet of things devices.

The new transformer design uses techniques Li’s group previously developed for making rolled inductors. “We are making 3-D structures using 2-D processing,” Li said. The team deposits carefully patterned metal wires onto stretched 2-D thin films. Once they release the tension, the 2-D films self-roll into tiny tubes, allowing the primary and secondary wires to coil and nest perfectly inside each other into a much smaller area for optimum magnetic induction and coupling.

The nested 3-D architecture leads to high turns ratio coils, Li said. “A high turns ratio transformer can be used as an impedance transformer to improve the sensitivity of extremely low power receivers, which are expected to be a key enabler for IoT wireless front ends,” said electrical and computer engineering professor and co-author Songbin Gong.

Rolled transformers can also receive and process higher frequency signals than the larger devices.

“Wireless communication will be faster and use higher-frequency signals in the future. The current generation of radio frequency transformers simply cannot keep up with the miniaturization requirements and high-frequency operation of the future,” said lead author and postdoctoral researcher Wen Huang. “Smaller transformers with more turns allow for better reception of faster, high-frequency wireless signals, as well as high-level integration in IoT applications.”

The new transformers have a robust fabrication process – stable beyond standard foundry temperatures and compatible with industry-standard materials. This study used gold wire, but the team has successfully demonstrated the fabrication of their rolled devices using industry-standard copper.

“The next step will be to use thinner and more-conductive metal such as graphene, allowing these devices to be made even smaller and more flexible. This advancement may make it possible for the devices to be woven into the fabrics of high-tech wearables,” Li said.

Cadence Design Systems, Coventor, X-FAB and Reutlingen University announced the grand prize winner of the Global MEMS Design Contest 2018 at CDNLive EMEA 2018, the Cadence annual user conference. A team from ESIEE Paris and Sorbonne University received the grand prize award for designing an innovative MEMS-based energy harvesting product using electrostatic transduction. Energy harvesting products can be used in implantable medical devices and other portable electronics that need to operate without an external power source.

The winning team received a $5,000 cash prize along with a complimentary one-year license of CoventorMP™ MEMS design software. In addition, X-FAB will fabricate the team’s winning design using the X-FAB XMB10 MEMS manufacturing process.

The design contest was launched two years ago at the 2016 Design, Automation and Test in Europe (DATE) conference, with the goal of encouraging the development of imaginative concepts in MEMS and mixed-signal design. Contest submissions were received from around the world, and three semifinalist teams were selected in February 2018 to compete for the grand prize. A panel of industry professionals and respected academics selected the grand prize winner based upon the degree of innovation demonstrated in the hardware and methodology, the novelty of the application, adherence to the design flow and the educational value of the submission.

“We are extremely excited to be working with the team from ESIEE and Sorbonne to manufacture their energy harvesting product,” said Volker Herbig, vice president, BU MEMS at X-FAB. “The design rules and process specifications provided in X-FAB and Coventor’s MEMS PDK, along with Cadence technology, should help ensure ‘first-time-right’ manufacturing of the winning team’s design. We look forward to bringing the winning contestant’s innovative thinking to life, using our well-tested open-platform MEMS and CMOS manufacturing technologies.”

“We are very pleased that the contestants used the CoventorMP design environment and XMB10 MEMS PDK to create and model their designs,” said Dr. Stephen Breit, Vice President of Engineering at Coventor, a Lam Research Company. “We’re looking forward to X-FAB’s successful manufacturing of the winning team’s design, which will demonstrate how this new approach can reduce the cost and time of developing new MEMS products.”

“We were impressed with the high-calibre and creativity of the designs submitted,” said Sanjay Lall, Regional Vice President EMEA of Cadence. “The contestants were able to successfully simulate their combined MEMS and mixed-signal designs in the Cadence Virtuoso® Analog Design environment and use the Cadence Spectre® Circuit Simulator for their transient simulations. Choosing one winner was very difficult, as all the finalists put forward excellent projects.”

A team from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Thuwal, Saudi Arabia, took home the second-place prize, which included a cash award of $2,000. The team from KAUST created a MEMS resonator for oscillator, tunable filter and re-programmable logic device applications.

Third place went to a team from the University of Liege, Microsys, KU Leuven and Zhejiang University. This team created a genetic algorithm for the design of non-linear MEMS sensors with compliant mechanisms and showcased it using a capacitive MEMS accelerometer. They received a cash prize of $1,000.

In addition to the cash prizes, all three semifinalists had the opportunity to present their winning entries to an audience of design professionals at the CDNLive EMEA 2018 conference.

For more details regarding the winning teams and their contest entries, please visit the MEMS Design Contest website.

 

ON Semiconductor Corporation announced the expansion of their manufacturing facility in Rochester, New York. The site develops and manufactures image sensor devices for commercial, industrial and professional imaging applications, including machine vision, surveillance, traffic monitoring, medical and scientific imaging, and photography.

ON Semiconductor is a global company with manufacturing facilities around the world – the end-to-end manufacturing strategy at the Rochester location enables success in these specialized markets. Located on a 4.2-acre site with over 260,000 square feet of building space, the expanded facility supports all four disciplines of the semiconductor business, wafer fab, wafer probe, assembly, and test and packaging operations for specialized high-performance CCD and CMOS image sensors.

“Not only is the screen on your smart phone or TV likely inspected with image sensors manufactured at the Lake Avenue site, but image sensors manufactured at this facility are also on the surface of Mars, orbiting Jupiter and the Moon, and used in commercial satellites that monitor the Earth’s surface,” said Michael Miller, general manager and director of operations at ON Semiconductor. “This expansion would have not been possible without the support and grant from Empire State Development and their willingness to partner with us. We owe them a debt of gratitude, thank you Governor Cuomo.”

“Manufacturing is a core competency for ON Semiconductor and the majority of ON Semiconductor’s manufacturing operations are done internally through the company’s industry leading cost structure,” said Bill Schromm, executive vice president and chief operating officer. “This expansion is important to our company, as it significantly increases our assembly capacity at the ON Semiconductor Rochester location.”

“Rochester is known for its innovations in digital imaging, including the design and development of state-of-the art image sensors over the past decades. Assembly and test has always been a key part of the equation, and as the resolution and complexity of the sensors continues to increase, these operations have become critical,” said Herb Erhardt, general manager, Industrial Solutions Division. “The increased level of capability and capacity enabled by this expansion is our answer to meeting these critical market needs, and the fact that we are doing it here in Rochester speaks to the capabilities of the teams we build here.”

The expansion is due in part to partnerships with local and state officials, including the Mayor and County Executive, Governor’s office and state officials, as well as members of Congress, all recognizing the opportunity to grow the local economy and leverage the unique advantages that Rochester can bring.

Greater Rochester Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Bob Duffy said, “Rochester Chamber congratulates member ON Semiconductor on the opening of its new assembly and test operation. With its global customer base, ON Semiconductor is a terrific example of the Rochester and Finger Lakes region’s emerging high-tech economy. Rochester Chamber stands ready to assist ON Semiconductor in any way that it can to help the company along on its path of growth and prosperity.”

“High-tech companies like ON Semiconductor recognize the highly skilled workforce that can be tapped into in the Finger Lakes,” said Howard Zemsky, president, CEO and commissioner at Empire State Development. “ON Semiconductor’s Eastman Business Park expansion is yet another great addition to the innovation ecosystem being established in the region.”

“Businesses like ON Semiconductor are bolstering the reputation of Rochester as a target area for high-tech investment,” said Lieutenant Governor of New York Kathy Hochul. “There is an enthusiasm throughout the City and the region that is contagious. Our economic investments have built new buildings and provided new job opportunities for residents of the Finger Lakes region. Most importantly, the Finger Lakes Forward strategy has brought back hope. I thank ON Semiconductor for their investment and continuing to believe in the Rochester community.”

The site celebrated the grand opening of the ON Semiconductor Assembly and Test facility with a ribbon-cutting, Wednesday May 9, 2018 at 11 a.m. WHAM-TV news anchor Ginny Ryan presided as the master of ceremonies for the event. Special guests included: Lt Governor Kathy Hochul, Howard Zemsky, president and CEO of Empire State Development, Robert Duffy, president and CEO of the Rochester Chamber of Commerce, Rochester City Mayor Lovely Warren, Vincent Esposito, Regional Director – Finger Lakes – Rochester Region Empire State Development and Monroe County Executive Cheryl Dinolfo.

ON Semiconductor is focused on energy efficient innovations in an effort to reduce global energy use. The company offers a comprehensive portfolio of over 80,000 energy efficient power management, analog, sensors, logic, timing, connectivity, discrete, SoC and custom devices utilized in, computing, consumer, industrial, medical and military/aerospace applications. The company operates a network of manufacturing facilities, sales offices and design centers which are located in key markets throughout North America, Europe and in the Asia Pacific region.

Houston Methodist researchers developed a new lab-on-a-chip technology that could quickly screen possible drugs to repair damaged neuron and retinal connections, like what is seen in people with macular degeneration or who’ve had too much exposure to the glare of electronic screens.

In the May 9 issue of Science Advances, researchers led by Houston Methodist Research Institute nanomedicine faculty member Lidong Qin, Ph.D., explain how they created a sophisticated retina cell network on a chip that is modeled after a human’s neural network. This will further the quest for finding the right drug to treat such retinal diseases.

“Medical treatments have advanced but there is still no perfect drug to cure any one of these diseases. Our device can screen drugs much faster than previous technologies. With the new technology and a few years’ effort, the potential to develop a new drug is highly possible,” said Qin.

Named the NN-Chip, the high-throughput platform consists of many channels that can be tailored to imitate large brain cell networks as well as focus on individual neural cells, such as those found in the retina. Using extremely bright light to selectively damage retina photoreceptors in the device, they discovered the damaged cells are not only difficult to recover but also cause neighboring cells to quickly die.

“This so-called ‘bystander killing effect’ in retina cone photoreceptors leads us to believe that once retina cells are severely damaged, the killing effect will spread to other healthy cells which can cause irrevocable damage,” said Qin. “What surprised us was how quickly the killing effect progressed in the experimental model. Damage went from 100 cells to 10, 000 cells in 24 hours.”

The NN-Chip is an improvement on Qin’s BloC-Printing technology, which allowed researchers to print living cells onto any surface in any shape within the confines of a mold. With this latest iteration, Qin’s lab loaded and tested cells with micro-needles in an open dish so they could tailor the neural network device, study individual cells as well as the progression of drugs through the platform’s many channels.

Retinal degeneration is a leading cause of blindness that, together with glaucoma, retinitis pigmentosa, and age-related macular degeneration, will affect 196 million people worldwide in 2020.

Qin hopes the platform will have additional applications in creating models for Huntington’s and Alzheimer’s diseases and screening therapeutic drugs.

Microfluidics focuses on the behavior of fluids through micro-channels, as well as the technology of manufacturing micro devices containing chambers and tunnels to house fluids. In addition to the BloC-Printing chip, Qin’s lab at Houston Methodist also successfully developed a nonconventional lab-on-a-chip technology called the V-Chip for point-of-care diagnostics, making it possible to bring tests to the bedside, remote areas, and other types of point-of-care needs.

SMI (Silicon Microstructures, Inc.) introduces the SM933X Series of ultra low MEMS pressure sensor systems. The fully temperature compensated and pressure calibrated sensor with pressure ranges as low as 125 Pa (0.50 inH2O) enables precise pressure sensing in HVAC, industrial and medical applications. Industry leading output accuracy (1% FS) and long term stability is achieved by combining SMI’s proprietary MEMS pressure transducer with a state-of-the-art signal-conditioning IC in one package.

The differential pressure sensor system is available in two configurations: SM9333, with a pressure range of +/- 125 Pa (0.50 inH2O), and SM9336, with a pressure range of +/- 250 Pa (1 inH2O). The total accuracy after board mount and system level Autozero is less than 1%FS over the full compensated temperature range of -20 to 85ºC. The 16 bit resolution provides the ability to resolve signals as small as 0.0038 Pa. The excellent warm-up behavior and long term stability further assures its expected performance over the life of the part.

The system supply ranges from 3.0 to 5.5V and it is well suited for low power applications with its low current consumption and available sleep mode. The ASIC architecture and higher order noise filtering provides low noise and extremely low EMI susceptibility.

The small SO16 package with dual vertical port allows for easy system integration and pressure connection, while the MEMS sensor itself is robust with high burst pressure and virtually no mounting or vibration sensitivity.

 

Key applications: HVAC, CPAP and pressure transmitters

The SM933X is the best solution for flow sensing applications, delivering high performance regardless of the tubing length and is not affected by particles in the airflow. It is versatilely applicable as an HVAC sensor, to determine the air flow in variable air volume (VAV) systems and detection of filter cleanliness in eg. air handling units (AHU).

In the medical market ultra low pressure sensors are used for CPAP flow sensing. The integration and use in CPAP devices is eased by the insensitivity of the sensor to the mounting orientation, its high resolution and low noise performance. Furthermore the SM933X improves pressure measurement in industrial applications, replacing costly, bulky equipment consisting of several components with one single sensor system in a small outline package and inherent long term stability. Key applications include pressure transmitters and pressure switches.

“SMI has had a tradition of being on the cutting edge of MEMS low pressure sensors dating back to the mid 90’s. With the launch of the SM933X series, the company looks to extend that leadership into its 3rd decade,” says Omar Abed, President and CEO of SMI. “We have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from our lead customers. We are convinced that the launch of this new product line will set the benchmark for ultra-low pressure sensors below 2 inH2O and usher in a new wave of innovation in medical and industrial flow and ultra-low pressure applications.”