Mid-Scale RI-1 (M1:IP): Implementation of a National Silicon Carbide Research Fabrication Facility

Silicon carbide (SiC) is a emerging and transformative semiconductor technology, enabling innovation across a broad range of groundbreaking research and revolutionary growing markets, including: (1) the transition from the internal combustion engine to all-electric vehicles, (2) modernization of the electric power grid through advanced solar inverters and protection equipment, and (3) powering data centers to provide greater reliability and efficiency, all of which will significantly impact American lives through more efficient use of energy, a cleaner environment, and economic growth. This NSF project aims to establish a national Multi-User SiC (MUSiC) fabrication facility, located on the University of Arkansas campus, is an open facility that can support US research and industrial interests, expertise, and ingenuity to drive the development of SiC integrated circuits and devices.

This will be achieved by creating a unique fabrication laboratory with the necessary equipment and instrumentation to realize the necessary semiconductor processes, train students on them, and execute the processes to achieve low-volume prototypes for US academic and industrial users. MUSiC will produce higher temperature electronics, sensors, and optoelectronics that can survive in geothermal wells, gas turbines and many other industrial processes, and extreme environment locations such as Venus.

The broader impacts of the project will unleash American ingenuity and help develop a needed workforce in the semiconductor fabrication industry, while bridging a gap between ideas formulated in the lab to high volume production provided by industry.

The proposed MUSiC research fab line at the UA includes the semiconductor processing equipment such as oxidation, annealing, etching, metallization and associated metrology tools. It will create a national solution to the instrumentation access, knowledge-gap, and bottlenecks that are impeding progress and ingenuity in SiC material, devices, and circuits.

This will be achieved through three primary objectives: (1) Deploy the equipment and processes that become the baseline of the MUSiC fab line to enable years of competitive research by all US researchers at universities, small and large businesses, and government organizations; (2) bridge the gap between the low-volume prototyping specialization of research universities and high-volume production for US manufacturing; and (3) Provide student training and education for future leaders of SiC technology in both research and industrial settings to encourage US growth in this field.

This project is jointly funded by the Office of Integrative Activities (OIA) and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) at NSF.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.