Technology of Thin Films

What do the following buzz words have in common: solar cells, batteries, LEDs, i-gadgets (iPod nano, etc)? – The critical component in their manufacture is thin films. There are hundreds of other not so catchy applications: drug delivery sub-systems, stents, computer components, hard drive components, automotive components, cutting tools, coatings on wind turbine blades, two-way mirrors, energy efficient windows, MEMS devices, prosthetic devices, the list goes on.

An Intel chip that makes your iPhone apps work – hundreds of thin film layers deposited and removed during manufacture; the ones that remain are shown in cross-section (intel.com).

What companies in Minnesota use thin film technology? 3M, Medtronics, Boston-Scientific, Seagate, Hutchinson, Honeywell, ADC, Hughes, IBM, Imation, Lockheed-Martin, MTS – and these are just the ones that come to my mind in a few minutes. Practically all high-tech manufacturers in Minnesota uses thin film technology.

 
More than ten different 3M thin film products are used in the manufacture of this wind turbine blade (3m.com).

What are thin films and what will you learn? Thin films are thin material layers ranging from fractions of a nanometer (monolayer) to several micrometers in thickness (Wikipedia). This class will introduce thin film technology to graduate and senior level undergraduate students in Engineering. Subject matter will be chosen to address a broad variety of interest across Electrical and Mechanical Engineering students. The class will start with concepts of mass transport and vacuum technology; discuss physics of thin film growth; physical, mechanical, optical and electrical properties of films grown by evaporation and deposition; lead in to equipment and processing methods such as epitaxy, chemical vapor deposition, physical vapor deposition; introduce concepts of thin film characterization and analysis; and connect these concepts to real world applications in a variety of industries. This course will cover metallic and ceramic/dielectric (covered by Dr. Iyer), and polymeric (covered by Dr. Haas) thin film technologies.

Instructor Biographies:

Surya Iyer is currently Engineering Manager at Polar Semiconductor Inc. in Bloomington, where he is responsible for development of manufacturing processes for the company’s products. At UST, Surya teaches manufacturing and design. Surya is on the Industry Advisory Board at the MN Center for Engineering and Manufacturing Excellence, Surya is the current Chairperson of the Energy and Environment Commission of the City of Edina, where he works with fellow residents, elected officials and City staff to develop sustainability strategies for the City. Prior to PSI, Surya held senior management and engineering positions at Cypress Semiconductor Corp. in Bloomington and Applied Materials, Inc. in Santa Clara, CA. He has 20 patents related to semiconductor processing and equipment design, and over 25 peer-reviewed publications. Surya was a post-doctoral fellow at Stanford University, CA, and received his Ph.D. and M.S. in Materials Science & Engineering from Washington University in St. Louis and his B.S. in Materials and Metallurgical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT).

Chris Haas received his bachelor’s and doctoral degree from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL, where he spent the majority of his thesis work on thin-film polymer systems.  Since graduating in 1997, he has worked at 3M in Maplewood, MN.  Chris spent 5 years in their Corporate Research Process Laboratory, where he worked on inventing novel ways to extrude and coat polymers, including work on surface modification, novel coatings, and thin-film extrusion and micro-extrusion.  Upon moving into 3M’s Security Systems Division in 2002, Chris began working on currency, passport, and identification card products.