Equipment & Procedures

SMIF consists of an Instrumentation Laboratory for the characterization and analysis of materials, and a Fabrication Laboratory for the fabrication of devices and micro/nano-structures.

All equipment is available to trained and certified users as follows:

  • Cleanroom Fabrication Lab: 7am to 12midnight, 7 days a week
  • All other Labs: 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Cleanroom
Code Equipment Model Applications
ACIDHOOD1 Small Acid Chemical Hood Air Control Acid Hood For acid chemical processing
ACIDHOOD2 Large ADA Acid Chemical Hood Air Control Acid Hood For acid chemical processing
ALDE1 Plasma-Enhanced Atomic Layer Deposition (PE-ALD) System Kurt Lesker ALD-150LX Plasma-Enhanced Atomic Layer Deposition (PE-ALD)
ARRAY1 Liquid Array Printer Scienion S11 sciFlexarrayer Liquid Array Printing
ASH1 Plasma Asher Emitech K-1050X O2 / Ar plasma ashing of photoresist and other organic materials
BIOHOOD1 Biological Hood Biological Hood Biological Hood
BIOHOOD2 Biological Hood Biological Hood Biological Hood
COATHOOD1 Spin Coat Hood - RESIST ONLY Air Control Spin Coat Hood For spin coating photoresist and EBL resists ONLY
COATHOOD2 Spin Coat Hood - ANY MATERIAL Air Control Spin Coat Hood For spin coating materials
DEVHOOD1 Develop Hood Air Control Develop Hood For photoresist base develop processing
ELL1 Ellipsometer Rudolph Auto EL III Thickness and index of refraction measurements of thin oxide, nitride, and organic films and optical constants of substrates.
EVAP1 E-Beam Metal Evaporator CHA Industries Solution E-Beam Deposition of thin metal films
EVAP2 E-beam & Thermal Metal Evaporator Kurt Lesker PVD 75 E-beam and thermal evaporation of metal films
FURN2-Tube1 High Temperature Anneal N-type doping Tempress 6304 4-Stack Furnace High Temperature Annealing (750C-1050C) in Nitrogen used for N-type doped substrates
FURN2-Tube2 Dry Oxidation Tempress 6304 4-Stack Furnace Dry oxidation (950C-1050C) in Oxygen
FURN2-Tube3 Low Temp Anneal and High Temp Anneal for P-type doping Tempress 6304 4-Stack Furnace Low Temperature Annealing (400C-600C) in Nitrogen or Forming Gas and High Temp Annealing (up to 1050C) in Nitrogen of P-type substrates
NANO1 Film Thickness Measurement Nanometrics 210 Film thickness measurements up to 50mm
OVEN2 Bake Oven Thermo Scientific Lindberg/Blue M General-Purpose Oven Annealing, baking and curing up to 260C in air
OVEN5 Vacuum Bake Oven Fisher Scientific Isotemp Model 282A Vacuum and nitrogen baking and curing
OVEN6 PDMS Oven Barnstead/Thermolyne Type 19200 Low temperature oven for baking and curing PDMS and similar materials
PECVD1 Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition System Advanced Vacuum Vision 310 PECVD deposition of Oxide, Nitride, and Oxynitride films
PHOTO1 Mask Aligner Suss MicroTec MJB3 Photolithographic patterning
PHOTO2 Frontside/Backside Mask Aligner Karl Suss MA6/BA6 For Topside or Backside photo alignment and exposure
PROBE2 Probe Station Cascade EPS150 Triax The probe station consists of a manual probe system with 4 independent probe micro-manipulators. It is configured with a parametric analyzer and a LCR meter for measuring current, voltage, resistance, capacitance, and conductance of devices and structures. This system also includes a 4 point resistivity probing system for making sheet-resistance and resistivity measurements of substrates and films
PROF2 Profilometer Bruker Dektak 150 Surface profiling and step height measurements
RIE1 Oxide/Nitride/Polymer Reactive Ion Etcher Trion Technology Phantom II Reactive Ion Etching (RIE) of oxide, nitride, and polymer films with fluorine and oxygen chemistries
RIE2 III-V Reactive Ion Etcher Trion Technology Minilock II Reactive Ion Etching (RIE) of compound III-V semiconductors using chlorine and bromine based chemistries
RIE3 Silicon DRIE SPTS Pegasus Deep Silicon Etcher Deep Silicon Reactive Ion Etching (DRIE)
RTA1 Rapid Thermal Anneal System Jipelec JetFirst 100 Rapid thermal annealing up to 1000C in air, vacuum, N2, or forming gas (N2/H2)
SCOPE1 Microscope w/ camera (manual) Nikon Eclipse ME600 Optical Microscopy
SCOPE4 Nomarski Microsope w/camera Zeiss AxioImager BF, DF, and Nomarski (DIC) optical microscopy
SOLVHOOD1 Small Solvent Chemical Hood Air Control Solvent Hood For solvent chemical processing
SOLVHOOD2 Large ADA Solvent Chemical Hood Air Control Solvent Hood For solvent chemical processing (including ultrasonics)
SPUT2 RF Dielectric Sputter System Kurt Lesker PVD 75 RF sputter coating of dielectric materials
SPUT3 DC Sputter System Kurt Lesker PVD 75 DC sputter coating of metals
THINKY1 Thinky PDMS Mixer/Degasser Thinky Mixer AR-100 Mixing and degassing PDMS

EBL
Code Equipment Model Applications
EBL1 E-Beam Lithography System Elionix ELS-7500 EX E-Beam Lithography System Electron Beam Lithography and SEM imaging

Sample Prep Room
Code Equipment Model Applications
ACIDHOOD3 Prep/Offline Acid Chemical Hood Air Control Acid Hood For acid chemical processing in a non-cleanroom environment
CPD1 Critical Point Dryer Bal-Tec CPD 030 Critical Point CO2 Drying of non-biological samples
CPD3 Critical Point Dryer LADD CPD3 Critical Point CO2 Drying of Biological Samples
EVAP3 Thermal Evaporator JEOL IB-29500VED Thermal Evaporation
GLOW1 PELCO Glow Discharge System easiGlow 91000 Designed to make TEM carbon support grids hydrophilic.
IMILL1 Ion Beam Milling System Leica EM TIC 3x Uses high-energy argon-ion beam to mill away material, creates smooth surfaces for electron microscopy or atomic force microscopy samples.
OVEN1 High Temperature Bake Oven Keison Carbolite LHT 6/30 Annealing, baking and curing up to 600C in an N2 ambient
OVEN4 Low Temperature Oven for Non-Hazardous Materials VWR 1350U Low temperature baking of non-hazardous materials up to 100C
PARYL1 Parylene Coater Cookson Electronics PDS 2010 LABCOTER2 Accurate deposition of parylene films
SAW3 Dicing Saw Disco DAD3220 Programmed dicing of silicon and other substrates
SCOPE7 Stereo Microscope American Scope SM-4TZ-FRL Stereo Microscope
SOLVHOOD3 Prep/Offline Solvent Chemical Hood Air Control Solvent Hood For solvent chemical processing in a non-cleanroom environment
SPUT6 Sputter Coater Denton Desk V Deposition of a gold film
VITRO1 Vitrobot FEI Mark IV Vitrifies suspension samples for imaging with the cryo-TEM.
VITRO2 Vitrobot FEI Mark IV Vitrifies suspension samples for imaging with the cryo-TEM.
VITROHOOD1 Vitrobot Hood Air Control For preparing Cryo-TEM and other TEM samples.
WIBO1 Wire Bonder West Bond 747677E Wire bonding to interconnect wire leads to semiconductor, hybrid, or microwave devices.

Electron Microscopes
Code Equipment Model Applications
MTOME2 Ultramicrotome with cryo chamber Leica Ultracut UC7 with Cryo Chamber For thin sectioning embedded biological samples for TEM or for thin sectioning frozen samples for AFM or EM.
SEM1 Scanning Electron Microscope FEI XL30 SEM-FEG The SEM is a high magnification imaging tool. Resolution is on the order of 2nm
SEM2 Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope FEI XL30 ESEM The ESEM is an instrument that can be used to image dry or hydrated samples.
SEM3 Scanning Electron Microscope with EDS Detector Apreo S by ThermoFisher Scientific (formerly FEI) The SEM is a high magnification imaging tool
SEM4 Tabletop Scanning Electron Microscope Hitachi TM3030Plus Tabletop SEM The SEM is a tabletop high magnification imaging tool with secondary electron and backscattered electron detectors.
TEM2 Transmission Electron Microscope FEI Tecnai G² Twin The TEM is a high magnification imaging tool. Resolution is on the order of 0.3nm
TEM3 Cryo Transmission Electron Microscope ThermoFisher Krios G3i Cryo TEM Cryo TEM for single particle analysis

MicroCT
Code Equipment Model Applications
MICROCT1 High Resolution X-ray Computed Tomography Scanner Nikon XTH 225 ST X-ray Imaging, Non-destructive CT, Quality Assurance, CAD vs. Actual Comparison (GD&T), Non-Destructive Internal Inspection, 3D Digitization, 3D Metrology, Surface Rendering, Morphology, Morphometrics
PRINT3D 3D Printer FormLabs Form 2 3D printing .STL or .OBJ 3D models created from software programs like CAD, or directly from MicroCT data.
RECO1 Reconstruction PC for MicroCT RECO1 X-ray CT Reconstruction of Nikon CT Data, Analysis of CT Data, Image Processing, 3D Visualization and Animation, CT Segmentation, CAD vs. Actual Comparison, Volume Rendering, Morphometric Data Collection, Quality Assurance, Graphics Work
RECO2 Reconstruction PC for MicroCT RECO2 X-ray CT Reconstruction of Nikon CT Data, Quick Analysis of CT Data, Image Processing, Quick Volume Rendering
RECO3 Analysis PC for MicroCT Velocity S58SQ - Quadro M6000 Analysis of CT Data, Image Processing, 3D Visualization and Animation, CT Segmentation, CAD vs. Actual Comparison, Volume Rendering, Morphometric Data Collection, Quality Assurance, Graphics Work

X-Ray Characterization
Code Equipment Model Applications
XDIF1 X-Ray Diffractometer Panalytical X’Pert PRO MRD HR XRD System The X-Ray diffraction system can be used for characterizing structural properties of a wide range of materials
XPS1 X-Ray Photoelectron Spectrometer Kratos Analytical Axis Ultra XPS is a technique for the detection of variations in chemical composition and oxidation state. The AXIS Ultra provides a high energy resolution capability for both conductive and insulating samples.

Optical Spectroscopy
Code Equipment Model Applications
OPT2 FT-IR Spectrometer Thermo Electron Nicolet 8700 Optical characterization of samples over Infra-Red wavelengths
OPT3 RAMAN/PL Horiba Jobin Yvon LabRam ARAMIS Raman and PL spectroscopy
OPT4 UV-Vis-NIR Spectrophotometer with Integrating Sphere Shimadzu UV-3600i Optical characterization of samples over UV-Vis-NIR wavelengths

AFM2 Lab
Code Equipment Model Applications
AFM2 Atomic Force Microscope Asylum Cypher Atomic Force Microscope Asylum Cypher ES Environmental atomic force microscope. This AFM allows for temperature control and fluid or gas perfusion. It also has blueDrive photothermal excitation, which, by directly exciting the cantilever photothermally, provides significant ease of use and performance benefits for imaging topography, mechanical, electrical, and magnetic properties in air and liquids.

B606 Lab Instruments
Code Equipment Model Applications
AFM1 Scanning Probe Microscope Digital Instruments Dimension 3100 The scanning probe microscope (SPM) produces high resolution, three dimensional images by scanning a sharp tip over the sample surface
MSA1 Micro-Strain Analyzer TA Instruments RSA III Mechanical analysis (stress/strain, etc) of materials samples such as polymer films, fibers, and elastomers
MTOME1 Ultra Microtome Ultracut For thin sectioning embedded biological samples.
PLAP1 Polishing and Lapping Machine Logitech PM5 Polishing and Lapping
SAXS2 Small Angle X-Ray Scattering - Point Source SAXSLab Ganesha Point collimated pinhole system for WAXS, MAXS, SAXS and Extreme SAXS of nano-particles for shape & structure analysis; GI-SAXS & GI-WAXS of surfaces for typography
SCOPE3 Fluorescence Microscope w/camera Zeiss AxioImager Fluorescence and Optical Microscopy
ZYGO1 3D Optical Profiler Zygo NewView 5000 The 3-D Optical Profiler uses interferometry for imaging and quantifying topographical features such as step heights, critical dimensions, curvature, and roughness.