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Projects/Programs

Displaying 51 - 75 of 98

Metrology for extreme ultraviolet lithography

Ongoing
Patterning with light 13 nm brings a host a new challenges Light at 13 nm is well within the vacuum ultraviolet, where radiation is strongly absorbed by all materials. This requires that the technology take place in vacuum and rely on mirrors rather than lenses. Moreover generating sufficient

RF Metrology for High-Frequency Transistor Models

Ongoing
Due to the challenges of high-frequency measurements, that includes inaccuracy in on-wafer calibration and a lack of instrumentation for transistor characterization, models are currently extracted from low frequency measurements and extrapolated to higher frequencies. This methodology has been shown

Metrology for Integration of New Magnetic Materials

Ongoing
Integration of magnetic materials remains a key challenge facing advanced packaging technologies. High power applications require voltage conversion at or near the die, and most practical power converters rely on inductors. Beyond power electronics, integration of magnetic components such as

Metrology of Purity and Contaminants in Solid Materials

Ongoing
Purity evaluations of high-purity bulk materials used in chips manufacturing are calibrated against reference materials that are often not matrix-matched to the materials under test. In other words, differences in the compositions of the calibrants and the samples being analyzed can result in large

Micro- and Nanoelectromechanical Systems

Completed
MEMS/NEMS are enabling technologies that bring new functionalities with the potential to radically transform markets ranging from consumer products to national defense. The meteoric rise of the smartphone is an excellent example, in which MEMS accelerometers, gyroscopes, microphones, displays, and

Multiscale Modeling and Validation of Semiconductor Materials and Devices

Ongoing
The limitations of scaling traditional CMOS (complementary metal-oxide semiconductors) designs have necessitated that the semiconductor industry consider new materials and design concepts. For wide bandgap semiconductor devices, optimization of materials and fabrication processes is needed to

Nanocalorimetry

Ongoing
The global market for semiconductor chips is $270 billion. Growth in this industry is driven by the need to enhance performance by packing more transistors into the same chip area, with a relationship between feature size and time that approximately follows Moore's Law. As the feature size shrinks

Nanocalorimetry Measurements

Ongoing
Accurate thermodynamic measurements are essential to understand fundamental properties of materials, providing direct and quantifiable insight into the thermodynamics of thin film reactions and phase transitions. Going forward, new classes of materials may only be synthesized as thin films, a scale

Nanocalorimetry for Semiconductors and Semiconductor Process Metrology

Ongoing
In September 2022, NIST published a report titled Strategic Opportunities for U.S. Semiconductor Manufacturing , which cited, among other challenges, the need to understand and improve heat dissipation and performance in advanced microelectronics. Specifically, there needs to be better measurements

Nanoelectromagnetics

Ongoing
The primary goal of this program is metrology that enables advanced nanoscale device (including electronics, spintronics, and life science) development. Based on current trends in electronics, we are focusing on metrology for two classes of devices: (1) nanoscale devices utilizing and exploring new

Nanophononic Metamaterials for Thermoelectrics

Ongoing
About 68 % of the energy produced in the United States is wasted as heat lost to the environment. About a quarter of this lost heat is present at temperature gradients suitable for recovery with thermoelectric devices, which use the ability of semiconductors to generate electricity directly from

Nanoscale, Element-Specific X-ray Imaging for Integrated Circuit Metrology

Ongoing
Industry roadmaps identify the characterization of nanoscale subsurface feature shape and composition as a measurement need for the semiconductor industry. However, IC interiors are difficult to probe post-manufacturing due to the presence of many close-packed and nanoscale subsurface features, of

Nanoscale Property Measurements by Atomic Force Microscopy

Ongoing
Over the past several decades, Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) has advanced from a technique used primarily for surface topography imaging to one capable of characterizing a range of chemical, mechanical, electrical, and magnetic material properties with nanometer resolution. Such characterizations

Nanostructure Fabrication and Metrology

Completed
This project develops semiconductor nanostructures, especially self-assembled quantum dots and photonic crystals, for a variety of applications including single photonics, laser diodes, and quantum optical metrology. It also develops quantum optical metrology based on other sources and detectors

The Nanotechnology Xccelerator

Ongoing
The Nanotechnology Xccelerator was announced on September 13, 2022 and was officially accepted for production at Skywater Technology Foundry using the Sky130 technology in Q1 2024. Sky130, which comes in both a conventional and open-source process design kit, is a 5-metal layer process. To

Neuromorphic Device Measurements

Ongoing
One type of device that is emerging as an attractive artificial synapse is the resistive switch, or memristor. These devices, which usually consist of a thin layer of oxide between two electrodes, have conductivity that depends on their history of applied voltage, and thus have highly nonlinear

Novel Sources for Focused-ion Beams

Completed
Commercial focused ion beams (FIBs) are used in a wide variety of applications. For example, they serve as diagnostic tools, slicing through a nanodevice to expose its internal structure. They can also shape nanoscale materials either by adding atoms to a structure or by shaving them off. And they

Optical and Microwave Spectroscopy of Microelectronic Systems

Ongoing
Collaborations with industry leaders have led to new understanding of magnetic damping in advanced materials and replication of our magnetic metrology tools. We investigate fundamental aspects of spin transfer in materials and structures that offer improved performance in future devices such as

Optical Probes of 2D Magnetic Phenomena

Ongoing
The unique measurement capabilities developed in this Project enable diffraction-limited, optical spectra (both Raman and photoluminescence) to be collected and analyzed as a function of laser energy, polarization, temperature, magnetic field, and device parameters such as current load and back

Plasma Process Metrology

Ongoing
Intended Impact The model for rf bias effects that we have developed should make it easier for industry to select optimal operating frequencies and may stimulate the adoption of new methods for RF biasing, such as multiple-frequency bias and non-sinusoidal bias. NIST studies of electrical endpoint