High Tech Ceramics News articles from January 2004

High Tech Ceramics News archives from January 2004

INDUSTRY ANALYSIS: CMP Market to Reach $3.3B by 2008.
January 1, 2004... The chemical mechanical planarization or polishing (CMP) process is one of the vital processes in the production of semiconductor devices, which uses CMP slurries and pads to planarize the surface of wafers. CMP becomes increasingly important...

PROCESSING & TECHNOLOGIES: Insulation Blankets for Very High Temperatures.
January 1, 2004... Thermal-insulation blankets of a proposed type would be exceptionally thin and would endure temperatures up to 2,100C. These blankets were originally intended to protect components of the NASA Solar Probe spacecraft against radiant heating at...

Ceralink Testing Signs Agreement.
January 1, 2004... Ceralink, Inc., a materials engineering and technology commercialization service, recently signed an agreement with C- Tech Innovations, United Kingdom, as the sole agent to license a patented microwave assist technology in North America. The...

HIP Production Unit Available from EPSI.
January 1, 2004... Engineered Pressure Systems, Inc. (EPSI) is a designer of high- pressure systems for manufacturing, testing, research, and specialized high-pressure applications. Prominent applications for EPSIs isostatic presses are manufacturing of...

Zircar Introduces New Lab Furnace.
January 1, 2004... Zircar Zirconia, Inc. has introduced a 4-inch cube furnace that the company claims is about one-half the price of a 6-inch cube furnace available from the scientific supply houses. The HOT SPOT 110 laboratory furnace can reach 1,700C and can...

POWDERS & NANO CERAMICS Nano-Sized Si3N4 Synthesized.
January 1, 2004... Over the past decades, silicon nitride has been known as an excellent material for high-temperature applications. It is believed that nano-sized silicon nitride powder enhances its sintering process and increases the plasticity, strengths, and...

Nanoparticle Arrays Explored for Terabit-Level Disks.
January 1, 2004... The density of information stored on magnetic films has increased by a factor of 2 million since IBM Corp. introduced disk drives in 1957. Drives that store 70 Gbits/square inch are on the market now, and research projects have demonstrated...

Patent for Nanophase Technologies.
January 1, 2004... Nanophase Technologies Corp., a technology leader in nanomaterials and nanoengineered products, has been issued U.S. Patent 6,669,823 on December 30, 2003, entitled Process for Preparing Nanostructured Materials of Controlled Surface Chemistry....

COATINGS: Low-Conductivity Thermal Coatings.
January 1, 2004... Thermal-barrier coatings (TBCs) that have both initial and post- exposure thermal conductivities lower than those of yttria- stabilized zirconia TBCs have been developed. TBCs are thin ceramic layers, generally applied by plasma spraying or...

FIBERS & COMPOSITES: Ceramics Reinforced with Nanotubes.
January 1, 2004... A ceramic material reinforced with carbon nanotubes has been made by materials scientists at UC Davis. The new material is far tougher than conventional ceramics, conducts electricity, and can both conduct heat and act as a thermal barrier,...

Engineers Make Pure Nanotube Fibers.
January 1, 2004... Researchers at Rice University have discovered how to create continuous fibers out of pristine single-walled carbon nanotubes. The process, which is similar to the one used to make Kevlar on an industrial scale, offers the first real hope of...

ADVANCED GLASSES: Asahi Sublicenses Sunroof Technology.
January 1, 2004... Asahi Glass Co., Ltd. has acquired a sublicense from its affiliated company, AP Technoglass Co., to use the SPD-Smart Light Control Technology of Research Frontiers, Inc. Asahi intends to evaluate this technology for the production of sunroof...

OPTICAL MATERIALS: Corning Consolidates Fused Silica Operations.
January 1, 2004... Corning, Inc. will consolidate the manufacturing operations of its high-purity fused silica and fluoride crystal materials production into its Canton, New York, facility, and its fluoride crystals components finishing production into Corning...

Fibers Carry Light at Thinner Wavelengths.
January 1, 2004... Researchers have developed a process to create wires only 50 nanometers (billionths of a meter) thick. Made from silica, the same mineral found in quartz, the wires carry light in an unusual way. Because the wires are thinner than the...

ELECTRONIC CERAMICS: Nanotubes Are Best Semiconductors.
January 1, 2004... University of Maryland physicists have found that semiconducting carbon nanotubes have the highest mobility of any known material at room temperature. Mobility is a measure of how well a semiconductor conducts electricity. A team of...

Long Life Using Mica Capacitors.
January 1, 2004... Over the last 40 years, a series of misconceptions regarding mica capacitor applications has led novice users to consistently over- derate wound or rolled mica/epoxy dielectric capacitors. Mica, K2Al3(SiO)3, a complex aluminum silicate in...

Low-Power RIE of SiO2.
January 1, 2004... Tasha Turner and Chi Wu of Caltech have developed a reactive-ion etching (RIE) process for NASAs Jet Propulsion laboratory to enable the formation of holes with steep sidewalls in a layer of silicon dioxide that covers a silicon substrate. The...

TI Develops Key Material.
January 1, 2004... Texas Instruments, Inc. (TI) (NYSE: TXN) has demonstrated the viability of a new high-k dielectric material at the prestigious International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM). TIs process to integrate Hafnium Silicon Oxynitride (HfSiON) high-k...

SUPERCONDUCTORS: AMSC Selected for Army Project.
January 1, 2004... American Superconductor Corp. (Nasdaq: AMSC) has been selected by United Defense Industries, Inc. (NYSE: UDI) as a subcontractor for the Electro-Thermal Ignition Pulsed Power System (ETIPPS) that United Defense is developing for the U.S. Army...

DOE Funding Down for 2004.
January 1, 2004... The FY 2004 U.S. Department of Energys Superconductivity Program is severely reducing this years activities in order to manage unexpectedly low funding availability. In FY 2003, budget pressures had reduced the program to $41.8 million, causing...

Prospects Brighten for HTS Power Cables.
January 1, 2004... Research from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) suggests that next-generation, high-temperature superconductor (HTS) wire can withstand more mechanical strain than originally thought. As a result, superconductor power...

Hot Time for Cold Superconductors.
January 1, 2004... A way to manufacture a low-cost superconducting material should lead to cheaper magnetic resonance imaging machines and other energy-efficient applications, say Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists. Hot isostatic pressing of wires made of...

HTS Transformer Undergoing Testing.
January 1, 2004... The Waukesha Electric Systems (WES) 5/10 MVA, three-phase, high- temperature superconducting transformer was moved the week of 15 November from a test area where it had been successfully cooled- down, leak-checked, and electrically tested at...

Intermagnetics, LANL Rated No. 1.
January 1, 2004... Intermagnetics General Corp. subsidiary SuperPower, Inc. announced that it had received top ranking in a federally sanctioned review for advancing second-generation high-temperature superconducting (HTS) wire technology. Together with its...

INDUSTRY NEWS: Altair Nanotechnologies Restructures.
January 1, 2004... Altair Nanotechnologies, Inc. announced that management and the companys board of directors have initiated a restructuring of the company. The board of Altair Nanotechnologies, Inc. has approved a plan to restructure the company....

EDO Wins Norwegian Contract.
January 1, 2004... EDO Corp. won two contracts from the Royal Norwegian Navy totaling $7.3 million. The larger contract is to upgrade the communications and data-link systems on the ULA-class submarines. The second is a follow-on contract for continued...

Ceradyne, Inc. Reports Preliminary Results.
January 1, 2004... Ceradyne, Inc. announced unaudited preliminary results for the fourth quarter and year ended December 31, 2003. Fourth-quarter 2003 sales were a record $33.0 million, an increase of 87.5% from the $17.6 million in the fourth quarter of 2002....

CALENDAR.
January 1, 2004... March 14-18, 2004. TMS 2004, 133rd Annual Meeting and Exposition, Charlotte Convention Center, Charlotte, NC. Contact: TMS, 184 Thorn Hill Rd., Warrendale, PA 15086; Tel: 724/776-9042, Fax: 724/776-3770. April 18-21, 2004. 106th Annual...