Micro Devices

Integrated Optics

Research in integrated optics is aimed at developing new materials and processes for integrating photonic devices and high-speed electronics in silicon. The goal of this research is to enable silicon photonic devices to co-exist with or replace electrical interconnect layers from the standard IC process. Research areas of particular interest include optical materials and fabrication processes, passive microphotonics, optical sources and amplifiers and nonlinear integrated optics

RF Integrated Circuits

The RF IC research program is led by Dr. Jim Haslett, who is currently entering the third year of a five year industrial research chair sponsored by TRLabs, NSERC, and iCORE. The goal is the development of the RF system on a chip with innovation in analog RF/microwave integrated circuits using sub-micron CMOS. Of particular interest are on-chip passive devices, integrated analog bandpass filters, and integrated CMOS power amplifiers. The RF IC research team presently includes six M.Sc. students, five Ph.D. candidates and two post doctoral fellows. One additional academic position has been funded at the University of Calgary through the chair.

RF MEMS

The RF MEMs research group is led by Dr. Michal Okoniewski, and is focused on the development of RF MEMs suitable for integration with standard silicon CMOS processes. Already fabricated are record breaking phase shifters, tunable capacitors and inductors. Currently under development are high Q passive inductors, filters and mm-wave reconfigurable antennas, as well as actuators and other unique MEMs-based structures. A second group of MEMS researchers is led by Dr. Dave Klymyshyn at the University of Saskatchewan. Closely affiliated with the Canadian Light Source (CLS), Dr. Klymyshyn’s group is researching the design and fabrication of high aspect ratio LIGA MEMs through the use of a beamline on the CLS.