This strongly laboratory-oriented course provides an opportunity for hands-on experience and familiarisation with the most common technologies used to fabricate microelectronic devices: photolithography, epitaxy, oxidation, diffusion, ion implantation, thin film deposition, chemical and dry etching and laser technologies. Training in clean room operation and semiconductor processing equipment is provided. The physical grounds and mathematical models for the technologies mentioned above are discussed, and used in a semiconductor device design exercise. An electronic device is actually fabricated in the laboratory and its electrical performance is evaluated. Step by step processing monitoring and control techniques are employed to correlate fabrication techniques and device performance. Researchers from the Centre for Renewable Energy Systems and the Research School of Physical Sciences and Engineering give invited lectures and run laboratory experiments in their particular field of expertise, thus placing the course participants in direct contact with cutting edge technologies in the broad fields of microelectronics and photonics. Master students will gain a more detailed, sounder knowledge of the technologies mentioned above by additional study under personalised supervision and guidance. More comprehensive, postgraduate level textbooks, such as VLSI Fabrication Principles (S. K. Ghandhi, John Wiley, 1994) and Silicon VLSI Technology (J. Plummer et al., Prentice Hall, 2000) will be used. In addition, computer modelling of semiconductor processes using advanced programs such as DESSIS or SUPREM may be available.

Admission to the ME degree and permission of the course coordinator.