On Tue, 23 Oct 2001, alvaro maturel wrote:
> Dear Friends,
> My name is Alvaro Maturell and I teach
> Microelectronics at the University of Panama. I am
[...snip...]
> two stages vacuum pump. What is the minimun facilities
> required to start a small lab?

Well, it looks like you have the capability to deposit
materials (sputtering) and to remove materials (ion
milling, wet chemical etching). What you appear to be
missing is a way to pattern your materials.

For this you need a mask aligner, a spinner to apply
photoresist, and a yellow room to do the work in.
Photoresist is typically very sensitive to contamination,
so you'd probably want to have your spinner and mask
aligner located on one of your laminar flow benches in a
yellow room.

I imagine you can get a spinner pretty cheap, but a mask
aligner may be more difficult. The used site I've encountered
on the web is at . It's basically
a site for buyers and sellers to contact each other. Most
of the prices are "inquire" or "offer."

You may also want to consider getting a probe station, so
you can take pictures of devices while they are being
operated.

You also may want to consider building a XeF2 dry etcher.
This is the cheap alternative to RIE, albeit an isotropic
one.

> What kind of
> experimental work is suitable to start with  this lab?

I really have no idea. All my work has been at UCLA, which
has an excellent lab. I've never had to leap those
particular hurdles. I would have to guess they would be
devices which do not require freedom from contaminants.
Bulk-etched microfluidics? Packaging technology?

You also may want to consider using foundry services.
After all, the theory is still the same.

> Best regards,
> Alvaro Maturell
> Department of Electronics
> University of Panama

Good luck,
Jesse Fowler
  UCLA/MAE Dept., 420 Westwood Plaza, Room 18-121, ENGR IV
  Los Angeles, CA 90095-1597 | (310)825-3977
"Our cause is a secret within a secret, a secret that only another secret
can explain; it is a secret about a secret that is veiled by a secret."
- Ja 'far as-Sadiq, 6th Imam