"This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5)"
The objective of this research is integration of optical, electrical and mechanical systems at nano- and micro-meter scale, thus enabling novel biomedical, energy harvesting and structural health monitoring devices and systems, otherwise not possible. The approach is to use a wafer aligner and bonder system for precision alignment and bonding of a diverse set of substrates including semiconductor wafers, glass substrates, metals and polymers.
The intellectual merit lies in combining top-down and bottom-up fabrication techniques to pioneer new interfaces between semiconductor-based devices and biomolecules that can be tailored for specific applications, both as sensors and actuators / controllers of biological phenomena. The interrogation of bio-molecules and understanding of real cellular interactions require 3-D biocompatible structures, chambers and interfaces. Ranging in length scales from a few nanometers to many microns, inter and intra-cellular mechano-transduction signals play important roles in many aspects of cellular functions.
The proposed Precision Wafer Aligner / Bonder will be part of NanoFab at UT Arlington, which is an interdisciplinary resource open to scientists within and outside of the University. The Dallas-Forth Worth metropolitan region is home to more than 400 high tech institutions. As a user facility, the NanoFab will make the wafer aligner / bonder available 24/7 to these researchers and provide them training for usage. An annual workshop as well as an online discussion forum dedicated to 3-D integration will be established.
