Innovative fabrication of PZT pillar arrays by a colloidal approach

An innovative approach for fabricating pillar arrays for ultrasonic transducer applications is disclosed. It involves the preparation of concentrated piezoelectric lead zirconate titanate (PZT) suspensions in aqueous solutions of epoxy resin and its polymerization upon adding a polyamine based hardener. Zeta potential and rheological measurements revealed that 1wt.% dispersant, 20wt.% of epoxy resin and a hardener/epoxy resin ratio of 0.275mLg -1, were the optimized contents to obtain strong PZT samples with high green strength (35.21±0.39MPa). Excellent ellipsoidal and semi-circle shaped pillar arrays presenting lateral dimensions lower than 10μm and 100μm height were successfully achieved. The organics burning off was conducted at 500°C for 2h at a heating rate of 1°Cmin -1. Sintering was then carried out in the same heating cycle at 1200°C for 1h. The microstructures of the green and sintered ceramics were homogeneous and no large defects could be detected. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd.

Nanopillar junctions.

The fabrication of nanopillar devices has been essential to the understanding and development of metallic spin electronics. This paper discusses the processes that can be used for the fabrication of such structures and the challenges in which they present, with particular emphasis on extreme sub-micrometre pillar structures suitable for the study of spin-transfer torque effects.

Superjunction IGBT filling the gap between SJ MOSFET and ultrafast IGBT

In this letter, we report E off-versus-V ce tradeoff curves for vertical superjunction insulated-gate bipolar transistors (SJ IGBTs), exhibiting unusual inverse slopes dE off/dV ce > 0 in a transition region between purely unipolar and strongly bipolar device behaviors. This effect is due to the action of p-pillar hole current when depleting the drift layer of SJ IGBTs during turnoff and the impact of current gain on the transconductance. Such SJ IGBTs surpass by a very significant margin their superjunction MOSFET counterparts in terms of power-handling capability and on-state and turnoff losses, all at the same time. © 2012 IEEE.

Adhesive properties of gecko-inspired mimetic via micropatterned carbon nanotube forests

The adhesive properties of the gecko foot have inspired designs of advanced micropatterned surfaces with increased contact areas. We have fabricated micropatterned pillars of vertically aligned carbon nanotube forests with a range of pillar diameters, heights, and spacings (or pitch). We used nanoindentation to measure their elastic and orthogonal adhesion properties and derive their scaling behavior. The patterning of nanotube forests into pillar arrays allows a reduction of the effective modulus from 10 to 15 MPa to 0.1-1 MPa which is useful for developing maximum conformal adhesion. © 2012 American Chemical Society.

Application of gel-casting to the fabrication of 1-3 piezoelectric ceramic-polymer composites for high-frequency ultrasound devices

A modified gel-casting technique was used to fabricate a 1-3 piezoelectric ceramic/polymer composite substrate formed by irregular-shaped pillar arrays of small dimensions and kerfs. This technique involves the polymerization of aqueous piezoelectric (PZT) suspensions with added water-soluble epoxy resin and polyamine-based hardener that lead to high strength, high density and resilient ceramic bodies. Soft micromoulding was used to shape the ceramic segments, and micropillars with lateral features down to 4 m and height-to-width aspect ratios of ∼10 were achieved. The composite exhibited a clear thickness resonance mode at approximately 70 MHz and a k eff ∼ 0.51, demonstrating that the ceramic micropillars possess good electrical properties. Furthermore, gel-casting allows the fabrication of ceramic structures with non-conventional shapes; hence, device design is not limited by the standard fabrication methods. This is of particular benefit for high-frequency transducers where the critical design dimensions are reduced. © 2012 IOP Publishing Ltd.

Bio-inspired hierarchical polymer fiber-carbon nanotube adhesives.

Hierarchical pillar arrays consisting of micrometer-sized polymer setae covered by carbon nanotubes are engineered to deliver the role of spatulae, mimicking the fibrillar adhesive surfaces of geckos. These biomimetic structures conform well and achieve better attachment to rough surfaces, providing a new platform for a variety of applications.

200V superjunction lateral IGBT fabricated on partial SOI

A 200V lateral insulated gate bipolar transistor (LIGBT) was successfully developed using lateral superjunction (SJ) in 0.18μm partial silicon on insulator (SOI) HV process. The results presented are based on extensive experimental measurements and numerical simulations. For an n-type lateral SJ LIGBT, the p layer in the SJ drift region helps in achieving uniform electric field distribution. Furthermore, the p-pillar contributes to the on-state current. Furthermore, the p-pillar contributes to sweep out holes during the turn-off process, thus leading to faster removal of plasma. To realize this device, one additional mask layer is required in the X-FAB 0.18μm partial SOI HV process. © 2013 IEEE.

Bio-inspired hierarchical polymer fiber-carbon nanotube adhesives

Hierarchical pillar arrays consisting of micrometer-sized polymer setae covered by carbon nanotubes are engineered to deliver the role of spatulae, mimicking the fibrillar adhesive surfaces of geckos. These biomimetic structures conform well and achieve better attachment to rough surfaces, providing a new platform for a variety of applications. © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.