Team battle to sprint forward semiconductor research! With the support of the "Key Equipment Construction Project of the Institute of Semiconductors" (Crystal Taiwan Plan) of the National Science Council, National Taiwan University has built an advanced semiconductor process research field on campus to provide one-stop services from component production, process development to analysis and verification. It is also open to researchers from other schools to share with teachers and students to promote industry-university cooperation and strengthen international research links, creating an open semiconductor R&D ecosystem that combines forward-looking research and the cultivation of international high-level talents.
Wu Dongxing, convener of the Planning Office and president of Jinan University, pointed out that in the past, universities and colleges across the country often faced the problem of insufficient hardware and equipment to conduct relevant research. In the past three years, the National Science Council has invested 300 million yuan in funding and has successively built 7 semiconductor colleges in the North, Central and South. National Taiwan University has also jointly invested approximately 100 million yuan to build 11 of the 60 important equipments for the semiconductor manufacturing process. This allows interested university teachers, students, and researchers across Taiwan to apply for the use of equipment through a one-stop website to promote the research and development of semiconductor technology.
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Wu Zhiyi, dean of National Taiwan University's Key School of Science and Technology, pointed out that the support of the Crystal Innovation Program has greatly helped the school's integration of semiconductor resources and equipment, creating a better clustering effect. National Taiwan University has also taken this opportunity to update equipment to a level that can compete with other prestigious foreign universities, and to support advanced research in schools in the North District.
Chen Jianfu, Distinguished Professor at National Taiwan University's Key Research School of Science and Technology, explained that the school has set up clean rooms and measurement equipment in the Research Excellence Building, covering equipment such as electron beam lithography with a resolution of up to 8 nanometers, atomic layer thin film deposition and etching, and measurement of nanomaterials and semiconductor components. For the clean room, the cumulative number of users in the past three years has exceeded 12,000, and the overall platform usage has also increased from 7.5% in 2013 to 24.8% in 2015. In addition, about 180 students participated in semiconductor process and component practical teaching courses, strengthening regional technological innovation and talent cultivation energy.
Among the highlights of the project's research results is the in-situ cross-section scanning microsemiconductor inspection technology developed by the team of Distinguished Professor Qiu Yaping of the Department of Physics of National Taiwan University, which can directly measure the electron transmission behavior at the contact edge between metal and semiconductor with atomic-level spatial resolution when the semiconductor device is actually powered on and operating. This technology was published in the journal Nature. In addition, the team of Professor Li Minhong from the National Taiwan University's Key Research School of Science and Technology has developed hafnium-zirconium oxide nanocapacitors that integrate energy storage, waste heat power generation and active chip cooling to provide new energy and thermal management solutions for future chips.
The school mentioned that the highlights of the industry-university achievements in related projects have been cooperation with domestic enterprises such as TSMC, Power Semiconductor, Etron, Fucai, Ruiyi, Innolux and Hongkang, with a total amount of approximately NT$84 million. Main research topics include advanced semiconductor process technology and equipment development, new generation memory and AI computing electronic components, silicon photonics and advanced optoelectronic components, etc. As for international cooperation, it has jointly established a semiconductor research center with the University of Pennsylvania in the United States to promote academic exchanges such as transnational special research and joint cultivation of talents.
