Purdue’s innovative semiconductor research powers future impact of Birck Nanotechnology Center

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Purdue’s innovative investment 20 years ago into a research facility for the emerging science of nanotechnology has led to the university being one of the world’s leaders in semiconductor and microelectronics research today — and into the future.

Panel discussions with former and current Purdue faculty and leadership, as well as semiconductor industry leaders, celebrated the past and looked into the future of research at Birck Nanotechnology Center as part of the facility’s 20th anniversary celebration Monday (Oct. 20).

“With our new 8-inch wafer-scale fabrication and characterization capabilities, Birck bridges lab-to-fab manufacturing through industry-compatible process development while remaining a flexible platform for innovation,” said Zhihong Chen, Purdue’s Mary Jo and Robert L. Kirk Director of Birck Nanotechnology Center and a Reilly Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

While two decades have passed, the pillars that Birck was established on remain: educate, innovate and collaborate.

Previous Birck directors and members of the team that initiated the work to create the center attended the daylong anniversary event. James A. Cooper, Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and President Emeritus Martin C. Jischke were recognized for their past roles. Tim McGinley, chairman emeritus of Purdue’s Board of Trustees, and Don Scifres, whose major gift funded Birck’s Scifres Nanofabrication Laboratory, also attended the anniversary event with Tim Sands, president of Virginia Tech University and a former Birck director, and Gary Lehman, current chair of the Purdue Board of Trustees.

The world’s leading semiconductor companies, including SK hynix; Semiconductor Research Corp.; GlobalFoundries; AMD; ASML; Entegris; IBM; Intel; DuPont Electronics/Qnity; MediaTek; Qualcomm; imec; Hitachi; Everspin; RTX; ChipFoundry; and Purdue’s virtual twin partner, Dassault Systèmes, as well as countries like South Korea, Japan and Taiwan, are among the partners working to advance semiconductors with Purdue researchers.

“None of that advancement could have happened if Purdue hadn’t invested in the Birck center 20 years ago,” said Mark Lundstrom, special advisor to Purdue’s president and the Don and Carol Scifres Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

As part of the event, several industry leaders reflected on and talked about building industry-academia collaborations and partnerships during panel discussions.

National leadership in microelectronics and semiconductors also is a cornerstone of Purdue Computes, a comprehensive initiative that spans computing departments, physical AI, quantum science and semiconductor innovation.

A group of classrooms converted to labs in the 1970s on the second floor of what was then the Electrical Engineering Building highlighted the urgent need for a modern facility, inspiring the early vision that ultimately led to the creation of the 186,000-square-foot Birck facility in Discovery Park District at Purdue, which serves as the center for the majority of Purdue’s semiconductor research. Birck was dedicated in October 2005 and today is a hub for research that houses the cutting-edge Scifres Nanofabrication Laboratory cleanroom and space for interdisciplinary work among 140 faculty members representing 33 different academic departments at Purdue.

About Purdue University

Purdue University is a public research university leading with excellence at scale. Ranked among top 10 public universities in the United States, Purdue discovers, disseminates and deploys knowledge with a quality and at a scale second to none. More than 106,000 students study at Purdue across multiple campuses, locations and modalities, including more than 57,000 at our main campus locations in West Lafayette and Indianapolis. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 14 years in a row. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap — including its integrated, comprehensive Indianapolis urban expansion; the Mitch Daniels School of Business; Purdue Computes; and the One Health initiative — at https://www.purdue.edu/president/strategic-initiatives.

Media contact: Brian Huchel, bhuchel@purdue.edu