New York State Support Helped to Undergird Success

Troy, N.Y. — Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has been awarded a Center for Advanced Interconnect Systems Technologies (CAIST) by the Semiconductor Research Corporation (SRC) to support research in microelectronic interconnect technologies, the backbone of the next generation of computer technology.

The three-year program is valued at more than $9 million, which includes $500,000 per year from New York state. The SRC will provide $1.5 million per year, and IBM will provide a minimum of $1 million per year in cash, scholarships, and equipment. Rensselaer will provide $250,000 per year in administrative costs and technical support.

Toh-Ming Lu, the Ray Palmer Baker Distinguished Professor at Rensselaer, will direct the CAIST. David Duquette, chair of materials science and engineering at Rensselaer, and Paul Ho, director of the Laboratory for Interconnect and Packaging at the University of Texas-Austin, will serve as associate directors.

The CAIST will draw on the expertise of New York researchers from Rensselaer, Columbia, Rochester, Cornell, and the University at Albany. It will combine that expertise with that of researchers from seven other universities around the country: Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Texas-Austin, MIT, UC Berkeley, University of Maryland, North Texas University, and Texas Tech. Of the 20 total research projects within the CAIST, more than half are with New York schools and six of those are at Rensselaer.

“The CAIST will assist the nation’s microelectronics, telecommunication, and supplier industries. It will determine their technological needs, identify areas of long-term technological relationship, and build partnerships that will advance economic growth here in New York state,” said Rensselaer President Shirley Ann Jackson.

“The challenges facing the semiconductor industry in the interconnect area require the depth of experience and great expertise that Rensselaer and its partners in CAIST have built over the years,” said John Kelly, senior vice president and group executive of the IBM Technology Group.

The research planned in this center will produce critical new concepts and technology innovations required for the industry, and will continue to provide well-trained and highly motivated students to serve the needs of the semiconductor industry workforce in the next decade and beyond, according to Ralph Cavin, vice president, research operations, at the SRC.

CAIST research will focus on increasing the performance of the interconnects on microelectronic chips through the use of advanced materials and 3-D chip stacking. Present interconnection technology is unable to keep pace with devices that can switch on or off in less than a billionth of a second. This limits the speed of computation, explained Lu.

The economic benefits CAIST will provide to New York state are already in evidence. Work in the previous CAIST led to the designation of the Focus Center - New York, headquartered at the University at Albany and shared equally by Rensselaer. In addition, CAIST has spawned new start-up companies such as Crystal IS, which works in high bandgap semiconductors and solid-state lighting, and Z-omega, which tests terahertz (THz) speed chips that will be used for cancer detection. Polyset, a smaller company, is launching a major effort to commercialize a product that was invented through CAIST research.

CAIST is a catalyst for growth in the microelectronics industry in New York. Large companies such as IBM, Kodak, GE, AT&T, and CVC have benefited from CAIST research including innovations in copper chip technology and low k technologies.

CAIST will also continue to produce top-quality students to serve the needs of the semiconductor industry workforce in the next two decades.

The CAIST will advance research that was conducted in the former Center for Interconnect Science and Technology at Rensselaer. That center, which served from 1996 to 2001, also was supported by the SRC.

Contact: Patricia Azriel
Phone: (518) 276-6531
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