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Vlado — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 13:01:13 +0100

New research consortium Q2M to develop novel microfabrication methods

Website Administrator — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 15:21:32 +0000

European research centres and industry have joined in a new research consortium called Q2M, short for “batch integration of High-Quality materials to Microsystems”. Q2M will develop novel microfabrication technologies for heterogenous integration of materials and microdevices. The European Union supports the consortium during a three-year period with 3.2 MEuro, through its EU Sixth Framework programme.

Microfabrication techniques are used for the production of a myriad of components and systems with feature sizes in the range from a few millimetres down to 100 nanometres. Application fields include the automotive industry, telecom applications, publishing applications, medical applications and biotechnical instrumentation. In the course of this project, the new techniques evolved will be applied to specific applications in microvalving, spatial light modulators (SLM), and wireless communication components (RF-MEMS).

- There exist a number of high-quality materials for sensing and micromotion control, such as shape memory materials, piezoceramic materials and specific ultra-flat single crystalline layers, which are displaying excellent characteristics for sensor applications and micro motion control. However, the mainstream microstructuring techniques stem from the microelectronic Integrated Circuit fabrication technology. Typically, combining these conventional microfabrication techniques with novel materials leads to various problems of fabrication process incompatibility! This is one of the major bottlenecks for the development of novel applications, says Wouter van der Wijngaart, associate professor at the Microsystem Technology Lab at KTH, and also Q2M coordinator.

The Q2M Consortium, which was created to push this technology beyond its current barriers, will follow two general strategies: using the high quality materials as a component of novel composites, and developing novel transfer bonding methods. Composites allow material incorporation to microstructures in a larger variety of manufacturing methods, whereas in transfer bonding, whole layers of high quality material can be transferred to semiconductor or polymer microstructure substrates in a batch manner using adhesive, glue-like layers.

The Q2M Consortium includes academic partners and technology development companies – each of these an expert/pioneer in a core aspect of this truly multidisciplinary scientific challenge – as well as technology end-users, which were chosen to anchor the work in real industrial needs and also to create the basis for further development and exploitation.

The project website address is http://q2m.4m-net.org.

For further information please apply to:
Wouter van der Wijngaart, Associate Professor
Microsystem Technology Lab, KTH, Q2M Project Coordinator.
Phone: +46–733254021, E-mail: wouter@ee.kth.se

The Consortium partners include:
KTH - Royal Institute of Technology (project coordinator, SE)
Cranfield University (UK)
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (BE)
FZK - Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe (DE)
Fraunhofer IPMS (DE)
Pondus Instruments (SE)
20/10 Perfect Vision (DE)
Steinbeis Transfer Centre ASICON (DE)
IBM Research (CH)
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland (FI)
LK Products (FI)

--> Go to press releases overview

External Links

Website Administrator — Sun, 19 Feb 2006 22:52:19 +0000

Q2M Partners:
Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) – SE
Cranfield University – UK
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven – BE
Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe – DE
Fraunhofer-IPMS – DE
IBM Research GmbH – CH
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland – FI
20/10 Perfect Vision – DE
Pondus Instruments AB – SE
Steinbeis Transfer Centre ASICON – DE
Pulse OY - FI

Related organisations:
Q2M was initiated with support of the European Network of Excellence "4M - Multi Material Micro Manufacture".

The Q2M User Group

Website Administrator — Sun, 19 Feb 2006 22:27:21 +0000

For industrial interessents:
The Q2M User Group is an industrial contact network for companies interested in the microfabrication technologies and their applications developed in Q2M.
User Group members receive periodical reports on the technical progress made within Q2M.
If you are logged in as a User Group member, please click here to proceed.
If you are not currently a User Group member but interested in becoming one, please contact:

Participation to the user group is free of cost.

Extra information and help

Vlado — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 16:55:38 +0000

This website runs on top of Drupal. Here are some quick links to useful drupal resources:

drupal.org - the home of the software
Handbooks - the home of the drupal documentation
4M forums
4M support blog

Q2M Press Releases

Website Administrator — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 01:14:10 +0000

March 2006: New research consortium Q2M to develop novel microfabrication methods
August 2007: The Nikkei Microdevices Magazine publishes a short article on the selective tranfer bonding technology developed by IBM within the Q2M project.
October 2007: The MST News special issue on polymer microstructures reports on the polymer microvalve technologies developed by FZK within the Q2M project.

The Q2M project home page

Wouter — Fri, 02 Dec 2005 17:06:50 +0000

Q2M Vision
To develop methods that allow the cost efficient combination and integration through batch-microfabrication of components and materials that are unsuited for monolithic integration.

Q2M Mission
To overcome the limitations of material and process incompatibility in microfabrication through the development of novel composite materials and novel transfer bonding methods.

Introduction to the project
Integration of high-performance materials in microsystems (integrated electronics, systems, sensors and actuators) is limited by process incompatibility mainly (materials, temperature budget). Many technology combinations promising novel functionality in a large range of applications can therefore either not be realised today (e.g. high-performance sensors/actuators on CMOS), or are manufactured on a per-device level in a pick-and-place scheme with resulting high fabrication costs (e.g. microvalves), hindering such components from reaching the market and forcing industry to disregard the development of many novel devices.

The main objective of Q2M is therefore to develop methods that allow the cost efficient combination and integration through batch-microfabrication of components and materials that are unsuited for monolithic integration. This allows novel functionality and reduced manufacturing costs.

Two main strategies will be followed to push the technology beyond its current barriers. The first is the development of high quality actuator materials and their micromachining methods suited for wafer-scale fabrication. The second strategy is the development of transfer bonding methods for transferring materials and devices to semiconductor or polymer substrates. The development of both strategies will be guided by the specifications from three application areas: microvalving, micro-optics and RF-MEMS (radio frequency microelectronic components). Test structures will evaluate the developed techniques.

Q2M User Group
The Q2M User Group is an industrial contact network for companies interested in the microfabrication technologies and their applications developed in Q2M. The purpose of the User Group is to promote the exploitation and dissemination of results. User Group members receive periodical reports on the technical progress made within Q2M. Participation to the user group is free of cost.
Please click here for more information.

Project Partners
The Consortium consists of twelve partners:
Seven research focussed partners, each expert/pioneer in at least one core aspect of the multidisciplinary scientific challenge:

Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Project Coordinator – SE
Cranfield University – UK
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven – BE
Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe – DE
Fraunhofer-IPMS – DE
IBM Research GmbH – CH
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland – FI

as well as five application focussed partners (2 SMEs, 3 larger consortia), chosen to anchor the work in real industrial needs while creating the basis for further development and exploitation, including:

Click here for more detailed participant contact information

Timeline
Start: 1 February 2006
End: 31 January 2009

Peer reviewed journal publications
Petros Gkotsis, Paul B. Kirby, Farizah Saharil, Joachim Oberhammer, Göran Stemme, “Thin Film Crystal Growth Template Removal: Application to stress reduction in PZT Microstructures.,” Applied Physics Letters, vo. 91, no. 163504, pp. 1-3, 2007.

F. Niklaus, M. Populin, A. Decharat, G. Stemme, “Adhesive Wafer Bonding Using Nano-Imprint Resists”, Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering, Jan 2007.

F. Niklaus, G. Stemme, J.-Q. Lu, R.J Gutmann, “Adhesive Wafer Bonding“, Journal of Applied Physics, Applied Physics Reviews - Focused Review, Vol.99, No.1, pp.031101.1-031101.28, 2006.

Wilson, S.A. et al (2007), 'New Materials for Micro-scale Sensors and Actuators - an Engineering Review', Materials Science & Engineering R-Reports 56 1-6 1-129.

R. Guerre, U. Drechsler, D. Jubin, and M. Despont, "Selective transfer technology for microdevice distribution", IEEE Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems (JMEMS), vol. 17, Issue 1, pp. 157-165, 2008.

P. Gkotsis, G. Leighton, D. Bhattacharyya, R. V. Wright, M. Zhu, P.B. Kirby, F. Saharil, J. Oberhammer, G. Stemme, “Platinum bottom electrode and thin film PZT observations following wafer transfer,” submitted to Journal of Integrated Ferroelectrics, 2007.

T. Grund, R. Guerre, M. Despont and M. Kohl, “Transfer bonding technology for batch fabrication of SMA microactuators”, European Physical Journal - Special Topics, E-MRS fall meeting, Warsaw, 2007, to be published.

M. Kohl, T. Grund, R. Guerre and M. Despont, Batch fabrication of SMA-actuated polymer microvalves, SMST 2007, Tsukuba, Japan, (2007), conference book, to be published.

Peer reviewed conference publications
Jourdain, RPR. & Wilson, SA, 'Thermally induced stresses in an adhesively bonded multilayer structure with 30-micron thick film piezoelectric ceramic and metal components' 4M Conference on Multi Material Micro Manufacture, Grenoble (2006).

Wilson, SA. & Jourdain, RPR. & Whatmore, R.W. & Morantz, PMH. & Corbett, J. & Hucker, M.J. & Warsop, C. 'Ultra-precision machining of 30-micron PZT-on-silicon laminates for piezoelectric MEMS' ACTUATOR 2006, Bremen, Germany.

M. Populin, A. Decharat, F. Niklaus, G. Stemme, “Thermosetting Nano-Imprint Resists: Novel Materials for Adhesive Wafer Bonding”, Proc. MEMS 2007, Kobe, Japan, Jan 2007.

S. Braun, T. Grund, S. Ingvarsdottír, W. van der Wijngaart, M. Kohl and G. Stemme, “Robust Trimorph SMA Microactuators for Batch Manufacturing and Integration”, The 14th IEEE conference on solid-sate Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems (Transducers 2007), Lyon, France, 2007, June 10-14.

R.Guerre, U. Drechsler, D. Jubin and M. Despont, “CMOS-compatible wafer-level microdevice-distribution technology”, The 14th IEEE conference on solid-sate Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems (Transducers 2007), Lyon, France, 2007, June 10-14.

P. Gkotsis, G. Leighton, D. Bhattacharyya, R.V. Wright, M. Zhu, P.B. Kirby, F. Saharil, J. Oberhammer, and G. Stemme, “Crystal growth template removal: application to stress reduction in PZT microstructures,” Proc. International Symposium on Integrated Ferroelectrics 2007, Bordeaux, France, May 8-11, 2007.

Niklas Sandström, Stefan Braun, Thomas Grund, Göran Stemme, Manfred Kohl, Wouter van der Wijngaart, “wafer-scale integration of robust trimorph bulk SMA microactuators”, ACTUATOR 2008, Bremen, Germany, June 9-11, 2008.

T. Grund, T. Cuntz and M. Kohl, "Batch Fabrication of Polymer Microsystems with Shape Memory Microactuators", Proceedings IEEE MEMS 2008, Tucson, USA.

T. Grund and M. Kohl, Batch Fabrication Methods for Active Polymer Microsystems, Smart Systems Integration 9.-10.4.2008, Barcelona, Spain, to be published.

M. Kohl, T. Grund, R. Guerre and M. Despont, Batch fabrication of SMA-actuated polymer microvalves, Proc. SMST 2007, Tsukuba, Japan, (2007), p. 67.

S.A.Wilson, R. Jourdain, T. Grund, M. Kohl and F. Korte, "Patterning new piezoelectric thin sheet materials for micro-valves and micro-pumps", ACTUATOR 2008, Bremen, Germany, June 9-11, 2008.

T. Grund, R. Guerre, M. Despont and M. Kohl, “Transfer bonding technology for batch fabrication of SMA microactuators”, E-MRS fall meeting, Warsaw, 2007.

Other publications
Sveinbjörg Ingvarsdottír, “Investigation of a Trimorph Bulk SMA Microactuator”, M.Sc. thesis, Microsystem Technology Lab, KTH-the Royal Institute of Technology, 2007.

Jutta Müntjes, “Feasibility Study for a SMA-Powder Composite Microcantilever”, Practical internship report, Microsystem Technology Lab, KTH-the Royal Institute of Technology, 2007.

Gaspard Pardon, “Feasibility Study for SMA-Powder Composite Microactuators”, M.Sc. thesis, Microsystem Technology Lab, KTH-the Royal Institute of Technology, 2008.

Timo Cuntz, “Aufbau von Mikroventilen im Batch- Verfahren“, diploma thesis, Institute for Microstructure Technology, Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe, 2007, unpublished.

Budget
Q2M is an EC sponsored Specific Targeted Research Project (No. 027926) under FP6 - IST Call 4.
Overall project budget: 4.730.000 €
EC Funding: 3.200.000 €

Contact information
For more information, please contact the Q2M project coordinator
Wouter van der Wijngaart,
Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
e-mail: wouter[at]ee.kth.se
phone: +46-733-254021