- Silicon PhotonicsSilicon PhotonicsThanks to the immense transmission capacity and low energy consumption, optical communication is penetrating ever deeper layers of data/communication networks. Servers are increasingly connected via glass fibers, peripherals are starting to leverage photonic cables that combine high capacity and convenient lengths, and soon computers will see internal functionalities transferred to the medium of light in form of integrated photonic circuits (PICs). The important new field of silicon photonics requires that these new components must be tested and assembled with the highest precision since a misalignment would mean lost yield, poor performance or failure.
- Technology of Active AlignmentTechnology of Active AlignmentThe development and manufacturing of photonic devices reminds us in many ways of the early years of the semiconductor industry in the mid-1980s. PI was a young company at the time and already deeply integrated into the production tools being deployed in early fabs around the world. But these tools were usually homemade by in-house or captive local systems integrators. The vast ecosystem of toolmakers that the industry enjoys today had yet to be born. The situation is similar in photonics today: the toolmaker ecosystem is just emerging. While the front-end manufacturing of photonic-enabled wafers can rely on the existing microlithography infrastructure, the industry for the back-end processes is just starting to develop. Some excellent tools and toolmakers have already emerged, and in-house test/assembly machine design remains an option for many silicon photonics device manufacturers.
- The Missing LinkThe Missing LinkAs an example of the fresh innovations emerging for photonics-device assembly, TEGEMA B.V. (NL), the multidisciplinary system integrator, has developed a modular machine platform for the automated assembly of optical components, in particular of photonically integrated circuits (PICs). The system, which works with submicron precision, can grow from tasks in research and development of PICs up to their series production thanks to its intelligent architecture.
- SiPh Wafer ProbingSiPh Wafer ProbingThe integration of photonic structures or elements on a silicon chip presents, already at wafer level, a multitude of new challenges for the testing technology of these elements. In order to transmit the design of the structure, from the concept through its qualification up to series production, a very large amount of performance data of the respective element is required.
- Technology of Active Alignment
- MicroscopyMicroscopyMicroscopy, like no other technology, is constantly expanding our knowledge about what holds the world together at its core, about what the building blocks of life look like. In life sciences, materials research, geology, archeology, mineralogy... again and again, microscopes in the hands of brilliant researches provide the newest findings and so make innovations possible.
- Configure your Microscope StageConfigure your Microscope StageThe precise and fast movement of the sample or the objective play a crucial role for achieving good results when working with light microscopes. The demands on stages and scanners are manifold. In addition to the position resolution, which directly correlates with the optical resolution of the microscope, velocity and dynamics are other elemental requirements for the motion system.
- Open Source Microscopy ProjectsOpen Source Microscopy ProjectsMicroscopy is one of the technologies that is constantly reinventing itself. The first microscopes from the early 17th century were very simple in design, but countless developments have steadily increased their performance.
- Electron MicroscopyElectron MicroscopyApplications for electron microscopy cover a broad spectrum from semiconductor inspection through materials research to molecular biology research. In conventional TEM as well as in the newer Cryo-TEM, which was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2017, the samples have to be nanopositioned with high precision in an XYZ coordinate and then tilted around one axis to produce a certain number of transmission images for image reconstruction.
- Atomic Force MicroscopyAtomic Force MicroscopyAtomic force microscopy supplies researchers and developers extremely high resolution topographical data from a large number of different minerals, polymers, mixtures, composite materials or biological tissue. This technology, developed in the 1980s, enables users to obtain subatomic resolved images of sample surfaces.
- Configure your Microscope Stage
- BiotechnologyBiotechnologyBiotechnology is one of the oldest applied sciences of humanity: Using yeast to bake bread or to ferment fruit to alcohol is, for example, biotechnology that is being practiced and developed for thousands of years. Today, this discipline has countless applications in medicine (red), agriculture (green), and the industry (white).
- Genome SequencingGenome SequencingBlue, brown, or green eyes? Which hair color? Which illnesses may affect us? Whose child am I? All of this information and much more is stored, or at least set, in our genes. In crime novels, but also in real life, genetic analysis is called upon for advice when it comes to finding an answer to the question, "Who did it?". The "genetic fingerprint" has become an often consulted and unmistakable evidence. Last but not least, genome analysis holds the key to groundbreaking discoveries for many health-related questions.
- Genome Sequencing
- Medical DevicesMedical DevicesProgress in medical research, diagnostics, and therapy requires high-performance, precise motion and positioning systems. High positioning precision, compact dimensions, low energy consumption, speed, and absolute reliability are just some of the requirements for the drives in use. However, the applications are so varied as are the technologies and solutions with which PI supports its customers on all levels of value creation: From operation robots through miniature drives for endoscopy cameras to aperture adjustment in radiotherapy or even the precise, targeted positioning of patients on operating tables that can be adjusted in six degrees of freedom.
- EndoscopyEndoscopyModern medical technology focuses on developing therapies that cause as little discomfort to patients as possible. Endoscopes that allow minimally invasive surgery, make an important contribution to this, for example, in laparoscopy. Especially during medical interventions, the demand for focused and detailed image information is of the highest priority in order to achieve the best possible chances of success.
- Surgical Robots: Patient Couch for RadiotherapyPatient Couch for RadiotherapyIn radiotherapy, it is particularly important to ensure that healthy tissues are protected. This is why, it is absolutely necessary to position the patient precisely during radiotherapy. Patient couches that employ hexapods from PI are very well suited for this task.
- Endoscopy
- AstronomyAstronomyEven in the earliest history, humans were incredibly fascinated by space; cave paintings or the Nebra sky disk bear witness of this. The question, "What are those shimmering colors in the night sky?" developed into the question of how galaxies, stars, and planetary systems developed. Highly sensitive systems such as the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array telescope assembly – in short ALMA – provide the data with which researchers are trying to solve these mysteries – and raise new questions.
- ALMA-ArrayALMA-ArrayA spectacular, albeit essentially impossible image caused a worldwide sensation on April 10, 2019: The first ever "photograph" of a black hole. 55 million light years away at the center of the M87 galaxy. The unbelievably strong gravitational pull means that even light cannot escape. But, thanks to the Event Horizon Telescope - a combination of eight radio telescopes - the participating researchers outsmarted physics to a certain extent and for the first time, created an image of a black hole's shadow. This shadow is cast by the radiation from the distorted light while being irrevocably absorbed by the black hole.
- ALMA-Array
- SemiconductorSemiconductorFor decades, no other product has shaped and changed our lives as much as the omnipresent microchips. Whether computers in all their variants, cell phones and smartphones, game consoles, cars and airplanes, yes, now even the home refrigerator, oven or iron and toaster – nothing works anymore without these jack-of-all-trades made of doped silicon. PI has played a large part in this success story.
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Miniaturization as a Catalyst for Success.
The driving force behind the ongoing success story of semiconductor components is the continuous miniaturization of their structures. The structure widths of the Intel 4004 chip from 1971, often referred to as the "first microprocessor ever", were 10 µm - that is, a hundredth of a millimeter. Real monsters compared to today, when chip manufacturers are talking about a structure width of 10 nanometers and less. Factor 1000. This shrinkage process, which the American Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel, had already predicted in 1965, has three decisive advantages. Above all, the compression of scale drove the performance explosion in the form of higher computing speed. The clock rate was increased from 108 kHz at the time to today’s several GHz, i.e. by a factor of far more than 1,000. In addition to the higher computing power, the space requirement decreases – and that even by the square of the reduction in the structure width. This means lower manufacturing costs per structural element and a significantly higher packing density. In addition, less energy is required for operation, meaning batteries last longer – enabling the current age of mobile computing and so much else, and reducing the environmental strains of cloud computing and Big Data, with its immense server farms. And so the results of miniaturization sound like a slightly different Olympic triad: faster, more economical, cheaper. If this development is transferred to aviation, for example, a passenger aircraft would fly from continent to continent within a few minutes, using hardly any kerosene and transporting thousands of passengers. At costs that could easily be paid from the thank-you box.
Highly Sensitive Manufacturing Processes
The manufacturing processes in semiconductor technology are extremely demanding and sensitive. It starts with the pulling of the monocrystalline ingot and continues through to the contacting and final packaging of the finished chip. Lithography is of crucial importance for miniaturization. In the exposure process, which is repeated several dozen times, the structures for conductor tracks, transistors and other functional elements are drawn on the silicon wafer. Maximum cleanliness, sharp-edged imaging of unimaginably small structures, highly dynamic, coordinated movement of masks and wafers in the lithography machines – the limits of what is technically feasible are being pushed ever further from chip generation to chip generation. Also with the help of PI.
Involved in Many Process Steps
In addition to lithography, PI components and (sub-)systems are also used in many other process steps in the manufacture of semiconductor components – for example in systems for quality assurance. And PI´s involvement in driving semiconductor progress is literally from the ground up, starting with enabling the most advanced vibration cancellation technologies in sub-floor platforms and tool structures.
The Customer in Focus: Much More than Technology, Components and Systems
In all of these systems and applications, the ability to move and position objects with nanometer and even sub-nanometer precision and high dynamics, or to hold a position precisely over the long term, without a power supply, plays a decisive role.
PI offers decades of know-how and a wide range of technologies – starting with piezo components, which are developed and manufactured in the subsidiary PI Ceramic, through sensors, piezo and electromagnetic drives to controllers, software and firmware – as well as components and systems.
Together with our subsidiary ACS, a market and technology leader in controller technology, we also enable the control of highly complex multi-axis systems for the next generation of demanding applications in semiconductor manufacturing up to EUV-L.
But that alone is not enough. It is our long experience as a supplier to leading system integrators in semiconductor manufacturing that enables us to understand and meet the high demands of this industry. With customer-specific service level agreements (SLA) and a global service team, we can react promptly to disruptions occurring at short notice. To this end, we have set up service hubs with highly qualified staff near the world's most important semiconductor production locations, where we keep spare parts for all critical components and assemblies. Based on extensive long-term tests of our components under a wide variety of climatic conditions and a Copy Exactly strategy, we offer our customers a high level of security against failure from the outset, i.e. high uptime. Also, PI has created clean rooms that even meet the exceptional cleanliness requirements that are required in the manufacture of components for EUV lithography.
On The Way to The Next Big Thing
The success factors of the semiconductor industry, in particular the further miniaturization of structures, will ensure innovations for a long time to come. And PI has exciting answers ready for the increasing demands on precision in motion and positioning.
And the semiconductor industry is changing at a faster pace than at any time since the invention of the integrated circuit. While Moore’s Law continues its relentless advance to drive ever-smaller feature sizes and higher performance and efficiencies, it is no longer just about smaller transistors on larger wafers. Now micro-optical components are being fabricated alongside microelectronics, and entirely new computing and communications paradigms are emerging which leverage the mysteries of the quantum world. As the applications change, so do chips, and the revolution proceeds. PI is right there, partnering with the leaders of change.
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