Microtechnology News articles from March 1999

Microtechnology News archives from March 1999

DEVELOPMENTS: Military Leverages Commercial Opportunities.
March 1, 1999... The Pentagon hopes to reduce the costs of and open up new applications for of MEMS technology by leveraging the commercial market for the devices while increasing the use of microelectromechanical system (MEMS) technology in large military...

Amgen Subscribes to Caliper's TAP Program.
March 1, 1999... Caliper Technologies Corp. (Mountain View, CA) says that Amgen Inc. has become the second drug company to subscribe to its high throughput screening Technology Access Program (TAP). Hoffman-La Roche was the first subscriber. The program...

University of IL Gets Plasma System.
March 1, 1999... Plasma-Therm Inc. (PTI, St. Petersburg, FL) sold a Shuttlecock 770 plasma processing system to the University of Illinois, Urbana Campus. The system will be used in the development of advanced microelectromechanical devices for biomedical and...

Centers of Excellence in Nanotechnology.
March 1, 1999... The German Ministry for Education, Science, Research, and Technology (BMBF) has invited AIXTRON AG to assist with research and development at two of Germany's Centers of Excellence in Nanotechnology. The six newly established...

Gene Chip Arrays for Water Quality Control.
March 1, 1999... Lyonnaise des Eaux (Paris, France), the world leader in water management, announced a joint R&D partnership program with bioMerieux, a world leader in in vitro diagnostics (IVD), to develop GeneChip arrays from Affymetrix that will...

iMEMS Sensors for Back Safety Device.
March 1, 1999... Analog Devices, Inc., will supply its ADXL202 iMEMS sensor to Bio Kinetics Corp., for use in the company's "Backtalk" product, a device designed to reduce the risk of back injuries in the workplace. The Backtalk device is one of several...

Micro-Cytometry Patents Awarded.
March 1, 1999... Micronics (Redmond, WA) announced that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued four key patents to the University of Washington. The University has granted Micronics an exclusive license to this technology for medical diagnostics, as...

APPLICATIONS: Microsensor Measures Liquid Viscosity.
March 1, 1999... The recently announced Berkeley MicroInstruments (Richmond, CA) microviscometer uses a unique silicon micromachined sensor to measure liquid viscosity. Measurements can be made continuously and in real-time. The unit consists of a small sensor...

Microsystem Safeguards Nuclear Weapons.
March 1, 1999... Sandia National Laboratories (Albuquerque, NM) has constructed one of the most complicated microsystems ever built. Called the "Micro Guardian," it is a trajectory safety subsystem that has undergone more than a year of research and development...

CCD Camera Has MEMS Shutter.
March 1, 1999... A proposed charge-coupled-device (CCD) camera would be mechanically shuttered by a planar array of micromachined, electromechanically actuated shutters. This proposal has arisen as part of a design solution for a visible/near-infrared imaging...

First Practical MEMS Optical Switch.
March 1, 1999... Scientists at Bell Labs, the R&D arm of Lucent Technologies, have built a microscopic optical switch that works like a child's seesaw and demonstrates the world's first practical optical switching technology using MEMS. "Our optical switch...

MEMS To Be Used in Two Products.
March 1, 1999... Analog Devices (Norwood, MA) says the company will supply its ADXL202 iMEMS (integrated Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) to Bio Kinetics Corp. (San Antonio, TX) and Electronics Development Corp. (EDC) (Columbia, MD). Bio Kinetics has designed...

FABRICATION: Silicon Etch Simulator Helps MEMS Design.
March 1, 1999... The Silicon Anisotropic Etch Simulator developed by IntelliSense Corp. (16 Upton Dr., Wilmington, MA) is an easy-to-use tool for the design of MEMS and microscale devices. With AnisE, it is possible to simulate etching under different time,...

Software System Aids Design.
March 1, 1999... IntelliCAD, a design and fabrication software system, was developed by IntelliSense through Navy SBIR funding. It is an integrated system which provides engineers with the tools needed to design, simulate, and optimize MEMS before entering the...

Integrated SOI Substrate for System-on-a-Chip.
March 1, 1999... Ibis Technology Corp. (Danvers, MA), the leading manufacturer of high current oxygen implanters and supplier of SIMOX-SOI (Separation by Implantation of Oxygen/Silicon-On-Insulator) wafers to semiconductor manufacturers, announced that they...

PROCESSING TECHNOLOGY SCALPEL Lithography Pushes Ahead.
March 1, 1999... Lucent Technologies (Murray Hill, NJ), Applied Materials (Santa Clara, CA), and ASM Lithography Holding N.V. announced their intention to cooperate in accelerating the development of SCALPEL electron beam lithography. The lithographic process...

III-V Epitaxial Custom Device Processing.
March 1, 1999... Spire Corp. (Bedford, MA) announced the availability of its III-V epitaxial growth and processing facilities, with technical support, to start-up companies and research and development organizations of larger companies. Since 1969, Spire has...

TEST AND MEASUREMENT: Instrument Monitors Temperature in Real-Time.
March 1, 1999... SensArray Corp. (Santa Clara, CA) is showing a palm-size Thermal TRACK, a troubleshooting and maintenance tool that allows direct multipoint wafer temperature measurements to monitor thermal cycles in lithography, CVD, RTP, and other...

Carbon Nanotubes Make Nanobalance.
March 1, 1999... Scientists at the Georgia Institute of Technology have created a nanobalance from carbon nanotubes that is sensitive enough to weigh viruses and other submicron particles. The nanobalance is one of many possible applications exploiting the...

Versatile Four-Point Resistivity Meter.
March 1, 1999... Optical Associates Inc. (OAI) (Milpitas, CA) introduced a versatile four-point probe surface and volume resistivity meter. The Loresta GP is a microprocessor- based meter that contains, in memory, all the data required to calculate the...

Monitoring Ultrathin Metal Film Stacks.
March 1, 1999... Rudolph Technologies (Flanders, NJ), a leading provider of film thickness metrology systems, has developed a new method to accurately determine the thickness of CVD TiN and ionized metal plasma (IMP) Ti. These deposition methods have been...

INDUSTRY NEWS: Microcosm Gets $6.7 Million.
March 1, 1999... Microcosm Technologies Inc. (Raleigh, NC) negotiated a $4.75 million venture financing agreement with Telos Venture Partners (Santa Clara, CA) and Wakefield Group (Charlotte, NC). The funds will be used to promote Microcosm's MEMS CAD software...

Microcosm Names MEMS Marketing Director.
March 1, 1999... Microcosm Technologies appointed John West as its new marketing director for Microfluidics and Optical MEMS. He is chartered with leveraging Microcosm Technologies' leading position in MEMS/MST CAD software tools and application engineering to...

Standard Microsystems Improves Website.
March 1, 1999... Standard Microsystems Corp. (Hauppauge, NY), a leading supplier of I/O integrated circuits for the PC industry and manufacturer of MEMS devices, has recently unveiled its redesigned and improved website located at www.smsc.com. The design...

Lam Announces Fiscal 1999 2Q Results.
March 1, 1999... Lam Research Corp. (Fremont, CA) announced revenue for the second quarter of fiscal 1999 of $141.9 million, compared to revenue of $292.1 million for the prior year period. The company reported a net loss of $24.4 million ($0.64/share diluted)...

MEETINGS: AVS Solicits MEMS Papers.
March 1, 1999... The American Vacuum Society (AVS) announced its Call for Papers for its 46th International Symposium being held October 25-29, 1999, at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle, Washington. This year's international symposium will...

CALENDAR.
March 1, 1999... April 5-9, 1999, MRS Spring Meeting on Ultrathin SiO2, and High K Materials for ULSI Gate Dielectrics, San Francisco, CA. Contact: Martin Green; Tel: 908/582- 5310; or Howard Huff; Tel: 512/356-3334. April 19-21, 1999, 2nd International...