9413848 Higgins This award is for the acquisition of semiconductor processing and testing equipment to make components necessary for efficient electronic/photonic interfaces. Georgia Institute of Technology has developed "hybrid integration" techniques that allow rf and optoelectronic functions to be incorporated on chips with costs comparable to standard chips. The equipment includes a molecular beam epitaxy unit for optoelectronic materials, a plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition unit for deposition of dielectric films, an ion etcher, a flip-chip aligner, a very high speed tester and polarization analyzer, and a workstation cluster for computational work. The equipment supports the design, fabrication, and testing of communications and network interface components including serial optoelectronic and wireless hybrid integrated interfaces, parallel network interfaces, and wave-division multiplex interfaces. ***
