Category Archives: LEDs

Dec. 16, 2008 – A month after dropping its outlook for both 2008 and 2009, Gartner has decided its previous “worst-case scenario” for the chip industry isn’t nearly bad enough. It now projects a -4.4% decline in revenues to $261.9B, instead of the 1.1% increase it said five weeks ago and a flat outlook in mid-November. This will mark the fifth decline in the past 25 years.

Few changes are seen in the top ranks for 2008 chip sales, led once again by Intel which increased its lead over No. 2 Samsung. Intel’s 13% growth includes its NOR business spun off earlier this year to a JV, without which sales growth was only 6.5%; that still outperformed the market average by nearly 11 points, Gartner notes. Best growth in 2008 goes to Qualcomm, but even the fabless giant is being pressed in 4Q08 as carriers and OEMs reduce inventory of CDMA-based devices and chipsets, the analyst firm notes.

No surprise that the big slumps in 2008 were in the memory sector — Hynix and Infineon both lost more than -20% vs. a year ago thanks to steep price declines caused by excess supply (for Infineon due to its ties to memory subsidiary Qimonda, which it is still trying to divest). Infineon had other problems, too, Norwood notes, pointing to the “ousting” of former CEO Wolfgang Ziebart, though in positive news the company did enjoy some high-profile design wins in the Apple 3G iPhone.


Preliminary worldwide semiconductor vendors (US $M).

And the outlook for 2009 is even bleaker. The analyst firm’s Nov. 6 outlook had projected a sales range of -10.3% to +5.0%, later lowered to -2.2% in mid-November — but now it’s projecting a -16.3% decline to $219.2B, kicked off with a record plunge of -24.4% in 4Q08. And the firm isn’t ruling out the possibility of an even steeper decline, possibly close to -25%, though such a steep dropoff in 4Q08 might indicate firms are overcorrecting to be on the safe side and the 2009 decline won’t be as severe.

“All semiconductor companies should be focused on cash preservation and inventory management,” warns Gartner research VP Andrew Norwood. IDMs’ gross margins are sinking along with factory utilization rates, but “focusing on inventory now should help the recovery when demand returns,” he said, adding that for larger companies it’s a good time to explore M&A activity.

Comparisons to the 2001 dot-com bubble aren’t nearly negative enough, since the current economic downturn stretches well beyond the technology sector, says Gartner research VP Bryan Lewis, in a separate statement. He notes that this time around inventories are more tightly controlled, which will help the market ease back more quickly.

Nonetheless, the picture for the memory segment is getting worse. “The DRAM market is so bad that suppliers must either significantly scale back supply, or the weaker players will be forced into mergers or bankruptcy,” notes Norwood. DRAM pricing should firm up in 2H09, but reports of increased support for government bailouts for Taiwan’s and Korea’s DRAM suppliers “would be a disaster for the industry as it would just prolong the current downturn.”

The prize for chip firms able to ride out these rocky two years? Solid growth in 2010 (14.6% to $251.2B) and 2011 (9.4% to $274.9B).

by Debra Vogler, senior technical editor, Solid State Technology

Dec. 15, 2008 – At IEDM this week, researchers at IMEC reported that minimizing the Ge in diffusion into a silicon capping layer is the key to boost electrical performance and reach 1nm EOT (equivalent oxide thickness) devices (paper #35.5, “Record Ion/Ioff Performance for 65nm Ge pMOSFET and Novel Si Passivation Scheme for Improved EOT Scalability,” J. Mitard, et al.). The group reported achieving an Ion = 478μA/μm and an Ioff,s + 37nA/μm at a Vdd= -1V in a 65nm Ge pFET. This performance was achieved, they say, through better control of the Ge in-diffusion using a low-temperature epi-silicon passivation process.

The group accomplished short channel control using a doping optimization scheme of Si CMOS at 65nm (i.e., halos, LDD and HDD). Regarding external resistance engineering, the researchers discovered that the reduction of NiGe thickness down to 5nm gave the best trade-off between low external resistance and voids contribution.


Figure 1: Schematic model to illustrate, in terms of defects, the difference between the two epi-silicon processes. (Source: IMEC)

Key to boosting intrinsic performance was gate stack passivation, particularly lowering the silicon passivation layer deposition temperature. The group found that lowering the silicon deposition from 500°C to 350°C dramatically reduced the Ge incorporation in the silicon capping layer and the Ge segregation to the top interface of silicon. The paper noted that Ge incorporation in the silicon passivation layer has a strong impact on the electrical measurements (see Figure 1).


Figure 2: Ion vs. T (Si-500°C). Narrow process window (~8 monolayers) to reach the optimum Ion performance. (Source: IMEC)

It was also found that Ion depends strongly on the capping layer thickness (see Figure 2) with a maximum in Ion occurring at 8 monolayers. Shifting even one monolayer from the optimum value led to an ~10% lower drive current. Vt control was also found to depend strongly on the chosen silicon thickness (see Figure 3). — D.V.


Figure 3: Sub-threshold swing at low VDS vs. Vt for epi-silicon process @ 500°C. Vt is fully uncontrolled and a trade-off has to be found in T(SI) between low SS and low Vt spread. (Source: IMEC)

December 12, 2008: A team led by a Northwestern University biomedical engineer has developed a new optical technique that holds promise for minimally invasive screening methods for the early diagnosis of cancer.

The researchers have shown for the first time that nanoscale changes are present in cells extremely early on in carcinogenesis. Their technique, partial-wave spectroscopy (PWS), can detect subtle abnormal changes in human colon cancer cells even when those same cells appear normal using conventional microscopy.

The study is published online by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A simple yet sensitive method, PWS quantifies the statistical properties of cell nanoscale architecture by using the signal generated by light waves striking the cell. PWS can provide information not only about individual cells, but it also can look inside the cell and see the cell’s fundamental “building blocks,” such as proteins, nucleosomes and intracellular membranes, and detect changes to this cell nanoarchitecture. Conventional microscopy cannot do this, and other techniques that can (to some degree) are expensive and complex.

“Imagine a cell as a house and the cell’s fundamental building blocks as bricks,” said Vadim Backman, professor of biomedical engineering at Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science. “Our technique can see not only the sizes of the house’s bricks but the details of those bricks. And it can show when those bricks are in trouble even when the house looks normal. Conventional microscopy can see the individual houses but not the bricks that make up the house. That’s a significant difference.”

Backman and his colleagues studied both human colon cancer cell lines and cells from a colon cancer animal model. In both cases, the PWS technique showed that an increase in the disorder of cells on the nanoscale parallels genetic events in the early stages of carcinogenesis.

“If the PWS screening technique for colon cancer is validated by appropriate clinical trials, there is the potential for preventing many thousands of cancer deaths each year,” said Allen Taflove, professor of electrical engineering and computer science at Northwestern. He collaborated with Backman in conducting computer simulations of how light interacts with the complex structure of a cell and is an author of the paper.

In addition to cancer research, PWS could find use in biomechanics (to study the nanoscale architecture of polymers, materials or tissue), tissue engineering and stem cell research.

“Anywhere you use microscopy you could use PWS and get more information,” said Backman. “PWS can work with virtually anything, and it can detect features as small as 20 nanometers.”

Thermal conductivity and elastomeric properties after aging reportedly make Dow Corning TC-2030 A&B thermally conductive adhesive suited for use in automotive electronics, LED assembly, and in the computer market. The silicone-based material provides long-term reliability and good adhesion to various substrates, such as anodized or cast aluminum, tin-plated copper and PCBs.

TC-2030’s thermal conductivity of 2.7 W/mK is said to be higher than traditional thermally conductive adhesives. With a viscosity of 190 Pa

By Fred Taber, BiTS Workshop
(December 11, 2008) MESA, AZ &#151 The Burn-in and Test Socket Workshop (BiTS), co-sponsored by Advanced Packaging magazine, celebrates its tenth annual gathering, March 8

December 11, 2008: Affymetrix Inc., a manufacturer of DNA microarrays, has announced that its technology was used by the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center to develop a molecular diagnostic test to help diagnose genetic defects in patients with inheritable forms of jaundice, the company announced in a news release.

Until now, evaluation has frequently determined the extent of liver injury in patients with jaundice. Cincinnati Children’s intends the Jaundice Chip, a custom microarray, to help expand diagnoses to include genetic causes, and more precisely identify patients at high risk for progressive liver disease.

A team of scientists led by Dr. Jorge Bezerra, professor of pediatrics and director of gastroenterology research at Cincinnati Children’s, designed the Jaundice Chip. In a study published in the January 2007 issue of the Journal of Gastroenterology, Bezerra reported the Jaundice Chip is highly effective in detecting the five most common genetic mutations in children with inherited causes of jaundice. Those five diseases represent about half of all pediatric chronic liver disease cases.

December 9, 2008: A key challenge of nanotechnology research is investigating how different materials behave; many everyday materials exhibit potentially beneficial new properties when shrunk to the nanoscale. Magnetic behavior is one such phenomenon that can change significantly depending on the size of the material. However, the challenge of observing the magnetic properties of nanoscale material has impeded further study of the topic.

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed and demonstrated a new method for detecting the magnetic behaviors of nanomaterials. They created a new process for creating a single multi-walled carbon nanotube that is embedded with 1nm-10nm cobalt nanostructures.

After a series of experiments, the research team has concluded that the electrical conductance of carbon nanotubes is sensitive enough to detect and be affected by trace amounts of magnetic activity, such as those present in the embedded cobalt nanostructures. It is believed to be the first instance of demonstrating the detection of magnetic fields of such small magnets using an individual carbon nanotube.

Results of the study were recently published by Nano Letters.

“Since the cobalt clusters in our system are embedded inside the nanotube rather than on the surface, they do not cause electron scattering and thus do not seem to impact the attractive conductive properties of the host carbon nanotube,” said Swastik Kar, research assistant professor in Rensselaer’s department of physics, applied physics, & astronomy, who led the project. “From a fundamental point of view, these hybrid nanostructures belong to a new class of magnetic materials.”


A scanning electron micrograph of cobalt nanoclusters embedded in multi-walled carbon nanotubes. Researchers at Rensselaer used these new hybrid structures, the first of their kind, to detect magnetism at the nanoscale. (Photo credit: Saikat Talapatra/Caterina Soldano)

“These novel hybrid nanostructures open up new avenues of research in fundamental and applied physics, and pave the way for increased functionality in carbon nanotube electronics utilizing the magnetic degree of freedom that could give rise to important spintronics applications,” said Saroj Nayak, an associate professor in Rensselaer’s department of department of physics, applied physics, and astronomy, who also contributed to the project.

Potential applications for such a material include new generations of nanoscale conductance sensors, along with new advances in digital storage devices, spintronics, and selective drug delivery components.

Co-authors of the paper include Caterina Soldano, formerly a graduate student at Rensselaer who is now a postdoctoral research associate at the Centre d’Elaboration de Matériaux et d’Etudes Structurales in Tolouse, France; Professor Saikat Talapatra of the Physics Department of Southern Illinois University, Carbondale; and Prof. P.M. Ajayan of the Rice University Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science.

Researchers received funding for the project from the New York State Interconnect Focus Center at Rensselaer.

December 9, 2008: With car sales plunging, demand for automotive electronics is dropping as well — except for the key area of electronic stability control (ESC) systems, for which sales are expected to continue to rise in the coming years and generate attractive opportunities for suppliers of microelectromechanical sensors (MEMS) used in these systems, according to iSuppli Corp.

ESC builds on anti-lock braking system (ABS) technology by correcting vehicle direction to help drivers maintain control of their vehicle during rapid steering and counter-steering changes, which may occur during events like sudden lane changes or swerves to avoid obstacles.

“Based on industry input, iSuppli’s new report on ESC systems and components includes groundbreaking research on factors driving the market, and the competitive positions of suppliers of MEMS accelerometers, gyroscopes, and pressure sensors,” said Richard Dixon, senior analyst, MEMS for iSuppli, in a statement. “Among the major findings is that shipments of ESC systems and associated MEMS will continue to rise, despite the current downturn, due to government mandates requiring stability control in the United States and later in Europe. This provides opportunities for at least six players new to the ESC market, either in development or sampling gyroscopes, and likewise four companies developing product for accelerometers. We expect that the new offerings may begin in the truck market before attacking the large automotive OEMs.”

MEMS accelerometers are a key component of ESC systems, measuring lateral slip, i.e., any sideways deviation from a car’s intended trajectory.

In this market, VTI Technologies was the leader in 2007 with a 53% share of industry revenue. VTI supplies all the MEMS accelerometers used by Continental Automotive Systems, the leading supplier of ESC systems. Bosch is in second place, supplying accelerometers for its own systems and to Mobis. It held a 29% share of ESC accelerometer revenue in 2007.

The gyroscope in an ESC system measures a car’s yaw rate. Systron Donner was the market leader with a 44% share of market revenue in 2007. Bosch was second last year with 30% of revenue due to sales of gyroscopes for its own ESC systems.

However, the company to watch in this segment is Panasonic, which held the No. 4 rank for ESC gyroscope revenue in 2007. The company surpassed Silicon Sensing Systems in terms of unit shipments in 2007, giving it the No.-3 ranking based on volume.

“Panasonic is on the rise in the ESC gyroscope market with a robust and inexpensive new gyroscope, and could jump several more places in the next five years,” Dixon said.

The pressure sensor modulates the braking of individual wheels to realize changes in trajectory calculated by the motion sensors of the ESC system. In 2007, Bosch led the market with 54% share of revenue. Sensata, a 2006 spin-off from Texas Instruments Inc., is the second major player with a 34% share of revenue, with Denso a distant third place.

December 2, 2008: Carl Zeiss‘ Primo Star iLED fluorescence microscope detects tuberculosis pathogens four times faster and with 10 percent more sensitivity than traditional brightfield microscopes whilst offering a rugged, inexpensive and energy-efficient format, especially useful for field clinics. Key to the performance is the integration of an energy saving LED light source into the Zeiss optics.

“Using LED technology has enabled us to package the speed and sensitivity benefits of fluorescence microscopy into a more robust and cost-effective product to help in the global fight against tuberculosis,” explains Audrey Lambert, Carl Zeiss UK.

Co-developed with FIND, the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics, the Primo Star iLED offers easy switching between fluorescence and brightfield modes, making it suitable for all simple laboratory and routine applications. The microscope is very sturdy and can be battery-operated for several hours in the event of power failure, a common occurrence in many of the countries where TB is prevalent. With reflected light fluorescence illumination, the product offers a significantly better signal-to-noise ratio and completely eliminates the risk of glare.

The new microscope was previewed at the 39th World Union Conference on Lung Health in Paris last month. With one in three persons already infected with the tuberculosis bacterium, and the emergence of multi-resistant strains and HIV co-infection, the WHO estimates that the disease will cause 30 million deaths in the next ten years.

“The Primo Star iLED was developed specifically to help low resource countries, in particular the public health sector of the 22 high TB-burden countries,” continues Lambert, “and will be supplied to these countries through FIND at a very favorable price as part of our commitment to alleviating unnecessary suffering.”

December 1, 2008: Two research teams from National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), led by Professor of Gwo-Bin Lee from Department of Engineering Science and Professor Yu-Chung Chang from Department of Surgery, are among 12 winners of the 2008 National Innovation Award sponsored by the Executive Yuan. Prof. Lee’s group won the award for an integrated magnetic bead-based microfluidic system for rapid genomic DNA extraction and genetic diseases. and Prof. Chang’s group won the award for Chang’s Needle for Simplified Hepatic Resection detection. The award will be presented in the convocation ceremony in Taipei around middle December.

Professor Lee’s research team presents a new magnetic-bead-based microfluidic platform integrating several moduli, including a human white blood cells pretreatment module, a DNA extraction module and a nucleic acid amplification module for fast detection of genetic diseases by utilizing MEMS (micro-electro-mechanical-systems) technologies. The device can save more time but still deliver accuracy on pre-treatment and diagnosis of the genetic diseases. Prof. Lee’s research group includes doctoral students, Kang-Yi, Lien and Zong-Min Xie, and an assistant Quian-Ru Liu.

Professor Chang’s innovative needle is designed to facilitate hepatic resections. Chang’s needle consists of a straight annular needle with a hook near its tip to catch the thread and a 15cm-long 18-gauge stainless steel sheath. Chang’s maneuver tries to simplify the technique of hepatic resection in order to reduce bleeding, to shorten the training time, and to enable a general surgeon, not a specialist of liver surgery, performing hepatic resections. Chang’s needle is cheaper, simpler, more compact, non-disposable, and easier to use. Therefore, more patients can benefit from this invention.