What Ford Is Driving


Jim Buczkowski, director of electrical and electronics systems research and advanced engineering at Ford Motor Co., sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to talk about quality, security, architectures, packaging and automotive's unique constraints. What follows are excerpts of that conversation. SE: As more electronic content is included in automobiles, what kinds of issues are you dealing... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Feb. 17


Swedish nano Sweden’s Lund University plans to build a pilot production facility for startups in the field of nanotechnology. The facility would be used for Swedish companies and researchers to build products. This is for companies who do not have the funds to build their own facilities or buy expensive equipment. The project originates from the successful research into nanowires at Lund ... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Feb. 10


Deadweight machines The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is in the process of cleaning, restoring and recalibrating its 4.45-million Newton deadweight machine. NIST’s deadweight machine, the largest of its kind in the world, is equivalent to one million pounds-force. Built in 1965, the deadweight system consists of a stack of 20 stainless steel discs about three meter... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Jan. 27


Calibration systems go portable The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is selling a new portable, vacuum-based calibration unit for use in instruments and other systems. The system, dubbed the Portable Vacuum Standard (PVS), is a compact unit that enables precise calibrations and measurements at a customer’s facility. Housed in the white “igloo” enclosure, the syste... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Dec. 8


Progress report on EUV resists The development of resists is a key part of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography. “EUV resists are production ready,” said Kevin Cummings, Sematech’s director of lithography. “However, through Sematech’s work with the resist suppliers, we have observed a deceleration in the rate of improvements. As a result, Sematech is working not only with the re... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Nov. 4


World’s fastest IC amplifier Northrop Grumman has set a record for the world’s fastest integrated circuit amplifier. The record has been recognized by officials from Guinness World Records. The amplifier uses 10 transistor stages to reach an operating speed of one terahertz, or one trillion cycles per second. This surpassed the company's own record of 850 billion cycles per second set i... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Oct. 21


Peanut butter and chocolate TEMs Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a new microscopy technology that combines two types of key measurements. The technology, dubbed the dynamic transmission electron microscope (DTEM), captures information about both temperature and the crystal structure... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Sept. 2


Looking at space dust The first analysis of space dust, collected by a special collector onboard NASA's Stardust mission and sent back to Earth for study in 2006, is more complex in composition and structure than previously thought. Researchers examined the dust using synchrotron light sources from three groups--the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Aug. 26


Smokestack metrology The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has nearly completed the construction of one of the world's more unusual measurement systems. The organization is devising a 50-meter horizontal smokestack at its campus in Gaithersburg, Md. The new facility will accurately determine the amount of gases discharged from smokestacks at coal-fired power plants and o... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Aug. 19


28nm brain chips DARPA-funded researchers have developed a 28nm chip that mimics the brain. The low-power chip is inspired by the neuronal structure of the brain. Designed by researchers at IBM under DARPA’s Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics (SyNAPSE) program, the chip consists of 5.4 billion transistors. Built on Samsung’s 28nm foundry process, the chip has ... » read more

← Older posts Newer posts →