Tag Archives: Small Times Magazine

Nov. 20, 2006 — Raymor Industries Inc., a developer and producer of single-walled carbon nanotubes, nanomaterials and advanced materials, announced that its wholly-owned subsidiary, AP&C Advanced Powders and Coatings, is currently expanding its thermal spray coating production capacity at its new facility in Boisbriand, Quebec to address growing market demand in the aerospace, power generation, and specialized industrial sectors.

The company said it will add two new workstations, one for atmospheric plasma spraying (APS) and one for high velocity oxy fuel (HVOF) spraying to its existing APS/HVOF booth, for a total of three APS/HVOF workstations.

New infrastructure will also be put in place for a fourth APS/HVOF workstation. In addition, the company said it will install a second vacuum plasma spray (VPS) production unit. This new unit will be specifically dedicated for the coating of orthopaedic implants and other biomedical components. Raymor said all of the workstations will be installed by the end of the year.

“Through the efforts of our sales and marketing professionals, we have identified real growth opportunities, particularly in the aerospace and power generation fields. This effort has led to the decision to more than double our current coating capacity,” said Stephane Robert, Raymor’s president and CEO, in a prepared statement. “Knowing that there is a substantial and growing need in providing thermal spray coating services to the local aerospace community, and given our expertise and background in material and thermal processing, AP&C is positioning itself to capture significant market share in this industry.”

He added that with the new biomedical VPS workstation the company is entering a new market, which he considers an example of how Raymor intends to leverage its experience in thermal spraying in opportunities that span different operating divisions.

Nov. 17, 2006 — NanoSensors Inc., a nanotechnology development company that develops instruments and sensors to detect explosives, chemical and biological agents, announced that it has completed manufacturing the initial prototype of its planned product to detect E. coli. The product is based on the company’s recently licensed nanoporous silicon-based biosensor technology to detect E. coli.

The proposed sensor has been designed to consist of two core functional parts: a disposable housing unit in which the actual sensor device is mounted and a separate, external data acquisition unit. Based on this design, the sensor device transmits signals across electrical leads to the data acquisition unit, which accepts the output signal from the housing unit and converts the signal to the appropriate format to display the results.

The first prototype of the disposable housing unit which holds the actual sensor device was built during October 2006. The company has completed a series of design tests on the disposable housing unit and following certain design improvements the company believes that it has a functional prototype.

In November, the company initiated a second testing phase in order to test the interoperability between the housing unit and the data acquisition unit, which is the second core part of the proposed sensor. The first hardware prototype of the data acquisition unit was recently completed. Initial testing on the integration of the disposable housing and data acquisition unit has started and NanoSensors says that to date no design problems have arisen.

Nov. 17, 2006 — Heidelberg Instruments GmbH, a Heidelberg, Germany-based supplier of direct write laser lithography systems, announced the order for an advanced MW800fs system by Shenzhen New Way Electronic Co. Ltd. of Shenzhen, China.

Founded in 1997, Shenzhen New Way Electronic Co. concentrates on production of advanced photomasks in the areas of LCD, PCB and other related fields.

“We are very pleased that Shenzhen New Way Electronic Co has again selected our Mask Write to produce their high end photomasks,” said Alexander Forozan, Heidelberg’s vice president of world wide sales and marketing, in a prepared statement. “China continues to be an important and growing market for us.”

With an installation base in over 30 countries, Heidelberg Instruments produces high precision maskless lithography systems. The systems are used for direct writing and photomask production by universities and industry leaders in the areas of MEMS, bioMEMS, nanotechnology, ASICS, TFT, plasma displays, micro optics, and many other related applications.

Nov. 17, 2006 — The NSF Center for High-rate Nanomanufacturing at Northeastern University announced the Roger H. Grace fellowship in nanomanufacturing. Recipients will be awarded a renewable one-year position at the Center with stipend to work on Center project or thrust area.

“Northeastern aims to be at the forefront of nanotechnology research,” said Ahmed Abdelal, provost at Northeastern, in a prepared statement. “This fellowship builds on our world-class, federally funded, national center in nanomanufacturing.”

Ahmed Busnaina, William Lincoln Smith Professor and Director of the CHN said, “We aim to recruit the best students to conduct research at the frontiers of nanotechnology and nanomanufacturing, leading to the commercialization of nanotechnology to provide unparalleled advantages in medicine, electronics, energy, food, renewable resources and many other applications. The Roger Grace Fellowship will provide us with the means and the opportunity to hire the brightest and highly motivated students to work in this field at Northeastern.”

The CHN is positioned to discover innovative answers to the wide-ranging challenges of nanomanufacturing and train scientists to bring these new techniques to industry. It is one of few research centers in the nation to focus solely on developing economically viable fabrication processes to bring inventions into commercial production, and do so more quickly than the usual multi-decade time frame. The fellowship was named for micro and nanotechnology consultant Roger Grace, president of Roger Grace Associates and a Northeastern alumnus who funded the fellowship.

Nov. 17, 2006 — Discera Inc., a developer of MEMS resonator technology and provider of next-generation timing solutions, and Vectron International, a maker of frequency control and timing solutions, announced that they will work together on MEMS oscillators for electronics manufacturers.

Discera’s PureSilicon resonator technology is intended for use in creating fully integrated, low cost, small form factor consumer electronics, and telecommunications products such as oscillators, filters and RF components. The company says its MEMS resonator-based timing products offer advantages in size, power and cost along with high quality and reliability.

The company has been demonstrating its technology in the Vectron booth at Electronica in Munich, Germany, this week where it is displaying video output from a standard camcorder that has its traditional crystal oscillator replaced with a Discera’s MEMS oscillator.

“Working with Vectron, an industry leader, lends tremendous momentum to the MEMS oscillator world in general, and Discera in particular,” said Venkat Bahl, vice president of marketing at Discera Inc., in a prepared statement.

Vectron is a world leader in the design, manufacture and marketing of frequency control, sensor, and hybrid product solutions using the latest techniques in both bulk acoustic wave and surface acoustic wave based designs from DC to microwave frequencies. Products include crystals and crystal oscillators; frequency translators; clock and data recovery products; SAW filters and components used in telecommunications, data communications, frequency synthesizers, timing, navigation, military, aerospace and instrumentation systems. The company is headquartered in Hudson, N.H. and has operating facilities and sales offices in North America, Europe and Asia.

Discera is a fabless analog semiconductor company focusing on tiny, high performance silicon resonators for the frequency and timing control markets. The company’s PureSilicon resonator technology is intended to be a fundamental building block for use in creating fully integrated, low cost, small form factor wireline and wireless products, such as oscillators, filters, and RF components.

Nov. 16, 2006 — Infineon Technologies AG unveiled a silicon microphone for consumer and computer communications devices that is approximately one-half the size and operates on one-third the power of conventional microphones.

The company says its MEMS-based microphone achieves the same acoustic and electrical properties as conventional microphones, but is more rugged and exhibits higher heat resistance.

Infineon says its microphone can withstand temperatures of up to 260 degrees Celsius and is more immune to vibrations and shocks than conventional microphones. Due to the high temperature-resistance, it can be soldered without difficulty onto any standard PCB and is ideally suited to use on fully automated production lines common to mass market consumer products. A 1.5 to 3.3V power supply slashes the miniature microphone’s power consumption to about one third (70 µA) that of ECM microphones.

The microphone consists of two chips, the MEMS chip and an ASIC, both of which share the same package on a surface-mounted device. The MEMS consists of a rigid, perforated back electrode and a flexible silicon membrane that serves as a capacitor, transforming acoustic pressure waves into capacitive variations. The ASIC detects these variations, converts them into electrical signals and passes them to the appropriate processing devices, such as a baseband processor or amplifier. The technology used to manufacture the MEMS microphones was developed at Infineon in Villach, Austria.

The new silicon MEMS microphone broadens the Infineon existing portfolio of mechanical and radio-frequency MEMS products, which include accelerometers, gyroscopes and pressure sensors and bulk acoustic wave filters.

Nov. 16, 2006 — Rigaku Americas of The Woodlands, Texas, announced that it will introduce a new advanced automated X-ray Diffraction system specifically designed and equipped for nanomaterials research: the Rigaku SmartLab NANO-Extreme.

The company intends to introduce the system at the Pittsburgh Conference on Analytical Chemistry and Applied Spectroscopy to be held February 26 to March 2, 2007 in Chicago.

The system combines a horizontal sample mount with patented Cross Beam Optic (CBO) technology, and is equipped with proprietary software. It is intended to offer nanomaterials researchers the full range of X-ray diffraction measurements in a fully-automated instrument.

Rigaku says the SmartLab NANO-Extreme is designed for a variety of applications, including powder diffraction for bulk nanomaterial identification, glancing incidence diffraction for the analysis of deposited structures, Small Angle X-ray Scattering for determination of general morphology and particle size distributions in both liquids and solids, and in-plane diffraction for surface orientation and analysis of ultra-thin layers, among other applications.


Rigaku’s SmartLab NANO-Extreme is specifically designed and equipped for nanomaterials research.

Rigaku will also debut its new MiniFlex II benchtop X-ray diffraction system and the Rigaku NANOHUNTER benchtop Total Reflection X-ray Fluorescence spectrometer.

The MiniFlex II’s variable incident beam slit and diffracted beam monochromator make it suitable for a wide range of applications, including phase ID, quantitative analysis, crystallinity measurement, and structural characterization.

The new NANOHUNTER features fully automatic control of all axes, allowing surface analysis and also multiple layer coating and substrate analysis.

Nov. 15, 2006 — Knowles Acoustics announced it had reached a major milestone in the history of MEMS microphone technology with the shipment of its 300 millionth SiSonic surface mount MEMS microphone.

Knowles Acoustics, which shipped its first MEMS microphone in 2003, has held the position as the leading supplier in MEMS microphone shipments for 15 consecutive quarters — nearly four years.

The company said the following products are among its current and future offerings:

  • Integrated ‘Mini’ Series — the third generation ‘Mini’ Series is now available with an integrated differential output for common mode noise reduction as well as an integrated switchable gain feature for hands-free applications.

  • Digital Series — the company says it fourth generation ‘Digital’ is well suited for applications where component density is at a premium — such as mobile phones, digital still cameras, and MP3 players. The ‘Digital’ is a single bit, Pulse Density Modulation (PDM) device, has an integrated sleep mode, and is compatible with stereo input applications.

  • On the horizon, says Knowles, is a soon-to-be-released fifth generation SiSonic — the ‘Mini Zero Height’. The new version is in a package that is 30 percent smaller than the original.

Nov. 15, 2006 — Completing five grand challenges concerning nanotechnology over the next 15 years could help alleviate concerns about its safety, according to a new report by a team of experts.

The group was led by Andrew Maynard of the Woodrow Wilson Institute Project for Emerging Nanotechnologies, and included co-authors from the Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM) and the SnIRC initiative (Safety of nanoparticles Interdisciplinary Research Center).

In a commentary appearing in the November 16 Nature, the team proposes five challenges to promote systematic research into nanotechnology risks. Programs that meet these challenges would help smooth out any bumps on the road to nanotechnology development raised by concerns of unforeseen health or environmental hazards.

“If the public loses confidence in the commitment — of governments, business, and the science community — to conduct sound and systematic research into possible risks, then the enormous potential of nanotechnology will be squandered. We cannot let that happen,” Maynard said.

The challenges include the development of:

  1. Instruments to assess environmental exposure to nanomaterials. These include portable, inexpensive aerosol samplers in the next three years, detectors for waterborne nanomaterials within the next five years, and smart sensors that can indicate potential harm to human health within the next 10 years.

  2. Methods to evaluate the toxicity of nanomaterials. These include an international agreement on a battery of in vitro screening tests for toxicity within the next two years to be validated in the next five years, and validated alternatives to in vivo toxicity testing of engineered nanomaterials over the next 15 years. Specifically, the researchers suggest the potential health impact of nanotubes, nanowires and nanofibers be investigated within the next five years.

  3. Models for predicting the potential health and environmental impact of new, engineered nanomaterials within 10 years.

  4. Ways of evaluating the health and environmental impact of nanomaterials across their life cycle within the next five years.

  5. Strategic programs to enable risk-focused research over the next 12 months. These include international and interdisciplinary collaborations and methods for communicating findings on nanotechnology risks and benefits to the wider public.

“This paper should be a landmark in the history of nanotechnology research. It lays out a clear, reasonable, prioritized, consensus-based set of priorities for examining the potential environmental and health consequences of nanotechnology over the next decade and a half. This paper should eliminate any remaining excuses for inaction in this vitally important area,” said House science committee chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) and ranking Democrat Bart Gordon (D-TN) in a joint statement.

– Charles Choi

Nov. 14, 2006 — STMicroelectronics, a leading semiconductor manufacturer, and Ball-IT Oy, a leading provider of advanced real-time wireless sensor solutions, announced a novel MEMS-based wireless motion-control device. Making its debut at ST’s stand at Electronica 2006, the smart golfball-sized object can operate as a free-hand personal computer mouse, compass, measuring tape, pedometer, or a 3D-object controller.

The device is enabled by ST’s MEMS technology. Ball-IT’s wireless ball controller responds to changes in position, direction, speed and acceleration, and translates those movements into immediate on-screen action. The ball is also sensitive to pressure, so its motion-sensitive user interface includes squeeze-prompted commands.

“This co-operation with Ball-IT confirms our conviction that high-quality, cost-effective MEMS sensors open up exciting new possibilities for intuitive man-machine interaction in consumer applications,” said Benedetto Vigna, MEMS business unit director, in a prepared statement.