WELCOME TO THE PENN STATE UNIVERSITY NANOFABRICATION LAB AND NNIN AT PENN STATE!
The Penn State Nanofab facilities consist of approximately 6000 square feet of clean room space and over 3000 square feet of supporting non-clean lab space that is located at our Materials Research Institute (MRI), Materials Research Laboratory (MRL), and Electrical Engineering West (EEW) Buildings. The largest laboratory in MRI contains clean process bays and adjoining semi-clean cluster areas that support all aspects of deposition and etching, micro- and nanolithography, and process metrology equipment. The second Keck Smart Materials Laboratory cleanroom in MRL contains several instruments specialized for complex ferroelectric oxide materials processing, which includes oxide thin film deposition (e.g., PZT, PLZT, SrTiO3, BaTiO3, etc.) and metal contact sputter deposition. The third lab in EEW contains additional process bays that support specialized MEMS processing systems for silicon and ferroelectric oxide device fabrication, which include new deep silicon and oxide reactive ion etch (RIE) tools and a XeF2 silicon release etch tool.
We make available specialized instruments and technical support in areas that mirror our faculty research strengths, including chemical and molecular-scale nanotechnology; electronics, optics, and MEMS; materials and physical sciences; and education. Our technical staff have made significant progress in transitioning nanoscale materials synthesis, chemical and molecular film patterning and deposition, complex ferroelectric oxide thin film deposition, and device fabrication processes from leading PSU research centers and faculty labs to the open-access user facility.
The Penn State Nanofab is part of the Materials Research Institute’s shared user facilities which also includes the Materials Characterization Lab and Keck Smart Materials Lab.
The MRI shared user facilities will be relocating to a new 248,000 gross sq. ft. interdisciplinary Materials and Life Sciences Building on central campus. The targeted occupancy date is spring 2011. The building will house a new 10,000 sq. ft. class 100/1000 clean room that is adjacent to an equal amount of quiet (vibration and electromagnetic) climate controlled space for sensitive characterization instruments.
