MRI: Acquisition of a Plasma Etching System for Multidisciplinary Research and Education

摘要非技术：扬斯敦州立大学（YSU）及其工业合作伙伴正在积极开展各种材料的研究，包括半导体、聚合物、碳纳米管、陶瓷金属复合材料和功能材料。加工这些材料的主要要求是能够蚀刻器件所需的图案。来自主要研究仪器计划的资金为购买电感耦合等离子体蚀刻仪器提供支持。该仪器能够在制造高效设备方面取得进展，并有助于教育和培训K-12，本科研究生和高中科学教师。随着YSU新的材料科学工程博士课程的推出，该仪器提供了一个关键的培训和研究工具，用于至少10个当前的研究项目，并为30多名博士和硕士研究生和博士后提供培训，每年有300多名本科生，因为它完全融入了YSU的本科和研究生课程。PI和co-PI积极参与各种外展和面向少数民族的计划，如扬斯敦地区物理联盟，少数民族学生夏季STEM和项目SEED，这些计划为招募代表性不足的群体的学生参加该仪器所支持的研究活动提供了平台。YSU及其工业合作伙伴的多学科材料相关研究活动包括：用于高功率电子和短波长光电子器件的带隙半导体、用于各种光子应用的多层聚合物系统、用于化学和生物传感器应用的碳纳米管、用于军事战斗应用的陶瓷-金属复合材料以及用于微机电系统的功能材料。高密度等离子体蚀刻为制造相关功能器件设计提供了至关重要的能力。此次收购电感耦合等离子体蚀刻系统的目的是支持YSU的多学科研究和教育。连同现有的国家的最先进的电子显微镜和光刻工具最近在YSU收购，该设备使这些材料的底层结构的更好的理解，以开发光电和纳米/微米尺度的设备，以及阐明管理光子和电荷载流子与纳米尺寸结构的相互作用的基本科学过程。

AbstractNon-Technical: Youngstown State University (YSU) and its industrial partners are aggressively pursuing research in various materials including semiconductors, polymers, carbon nanotubes, ceramic-metallic composites and functional materials. A major requirement in processing these materials is the ability to etch desired patterns for devices. Funds from the Major Research Instrumentation program provide support for acquisition of an inductively-coupled plasma etching instrument. This instrument enables advances in fabricating efficient devices and helps to educate and train K-12, undergraduate & graduate students and high school science teachers. With the launch of YSU's new PhD program in Materials Science & Engineering, this instrument provides a pivotal training and research tool for use in at least 10 current research projects and provides training to over 30 PhD and MS graduate students and postdocs, and more than 300 undergraduate students per year as it is fully integrated into undergraduate and graduate curriculum at YSU. The PI and co-PIs actively participate in various outreach and minority-oriented programs such as the Youngstown Area Physics Alliance, Summer STEM for Minority Students and Project SEED which provide a platform for recruiting students from underrepresented groups to the research activities enabled by this instrument.Technical: The multi-disciplinary materials-related research activities at YSU and its industrial partners include wide-bandgap semiconductors for high power electronic and short wavelength optoelectronic devices, multilayered polymeric systems for various photonic applications, carbon nanotubes for chemical and biological sensor applications, ceramic-metallic composites for military combat applications, and functional materials for micro-electro-mechanical systems. High density plasma etching offers a vital capability for fabricating the relevant functional device designs. The goal of this acquisition of the inductively-coupled plasma etching system is to support multidisciplinary research and education at YSU. Together with the existing state-of-the-art electron microscopy and lithography tools recently acquired at YSU, this equipment enables better understanding of the underlying structures of these materials in order to develop optoelectronic and nano/micro scale devices as well as elucidate the basic scientific processes governing the interaction of photons and charge carriers with nanometer size structures.