This book is concerned with polymeric hydrogels, which are considered as one of the most promising types of new polymer-based materials. Each chapter in this book describes a selected class of polymeric hydrogels, such as superabsorbent hybrid nanohydrogels, conducting polymer hydrogels, polysaccharide-based or protein-based hydrogels, or gels based on synthetic polymers. In this way, the book also addresses some of the fascinating properties and applications of polymeric hydrogels: they are three-dimensional, hydrophilic, polymeric networks that can absorb, swell and retain large quantities of water or aqueous fluids. In combination with metal nanoparticles, nanofibrils or nanowhiskers, which may be embedded in the gels, they find widespread applications, ranging from agriculture, and waste water treatment, over electronics, to pharmaceutical and biomedical applications. Applications mentioned in this book include electro sensors, capacitors, electromechanical actuators, and even artificial muscles.

Covers the statistical analysis and optimization issues arising due to increased process variations in current technologies.

Comprises a valuable reference for statistical analysis and optimization techniques in current and future VLSI design for CAD-Tool developers and for researchers interested in starting work in this very active area of research.

Written by author who lead much research in this area who provide novel ideas and approaches to handle the addressed issues

"Photophysics of Carbon Nanotubes Interfaced with Organic and Inorganic Materials "describes physical, optical and spectroscopic properties of the emerging class of nanocomposites formed from carbon nanotubes (CNTs) interfacing with organic and inorganic materials.

The three main chapters detail novel trends in photophysics related to the interaction of light with various carbon nanotube composites from relatively simple CNT/small molecule assemblies to complex hybrids such as CNT/Si and CNT/DNA nanostructures. The latest experimental results are followed up with detailed discussions and scientific and technological perspectives to provide a through coverage of major topics including:

-Light harvesting, energy conversion, photoinduced charge separation and transport in CNT based nanohybrids

-CNT/polymer composites exhibiting photoactuation; and

-Optical spectroscopy and structure of CNT/DNA complexes.

Including original data and a short review of recent research, "Photophysics of Carbon Nanotubes Interfaced with Organic and Inorganic Materials" makes this emerging field of photophysics and its applications available to academics and professionals working with carbon nanotube composites in fundamental and applied fields

The book develops a comprehensive understanding of the surface impedance of the oxide high-temperature superconductors in comparison with the conventional superconductor Nb3Sn. Linear and nonlinear microwave responses are treated separately, both in terms of models, theories or numerical approaches and in terms of experimental results. The theoretical treatment connects fundamental aspects of superconductivity to the specific high-frequency properties. The experimental data review the state of the art, as reported by many international groups. The book describes further the main features of appropriate preparation, handling, mounting, and refrigeration techniques, and finally discusses possible applications in passive and active microwave devices.

This book provides an in-depth, comprehensive and up-to-date coverage of the subject of plasma charging damage in modern VLSI circuit manufacturing. It is written for beginners as well as practitioners. For beginners, this book presents an easy-to-follow, unified explanation of various charging-damage phenomena, the goal being to provide them with a solid foundation for taking on real damage problems encountered in VLSI manufacturing. For practitioners, it can help bridge the gap between disciplines by providing all of the necessary background materials in one place.Drawing on the author's wide range of experience in plasma science, processing technologies, device physics and reliability physics, the text includes information on: - plasma and mechanisms of plasma damage;- wear-out and breakdown of thin gate-oxides;- the impact of processing equipment on damage;- methods of damage measurement;- damage management; - gate-oxide scaling.

Authored by leading experts from around the world, the three-volume Handbook of Nanostructured Thin Films and Coatings gives scientific researchers and product engineers a resource as dynamic and flexible as the field itself. The first two volumes cover the latest research and application of the mechanical and functional properties of thin films and coatings, while the third volume explores the cutting-edge organic nanostructured devices used to produce clean energy.

This third volume, Organic Nanostructured Thin Film Devices and Coatings for Clean Energy, addresses various aspects of the processing and properties of organic thin films, devices, and coatings for clean energy applications. Topics covered include:

• Thin-film solar cells based on the use of polycrystalline thin-film materials
• Anodized titania nanotube array and its application in dye-sensitized solar cells
• Progress and challenges associated with photovoltaic applications of silicon nanocrystalline materials
• Semiconductive nanocomposite films for clean environment
• Thin-coating technologies and applications in high-temperature solid oxide fuel cells
• Nanoscale organic molecular thin films for information memory applications

A complete resource, this handbook provides the detailed explanations that newcomers need, as well as the latest cutting-edge research and data for experts. Covering a wide range of mechanical and functional technologies, including those used in clean energy, these books also feature figures, tables, and images that will aid research and help professionals acquire and maintain a solid grasp of this burgeoning field.

The Handbook of Nanostructured Thin Films and Coatings is composed of this volume and two others:

Nanostructured Thin Films and Coatings, Functional Properties

Nanostructured Thin Films and Coatings, Mechanical Properties

We have reached the double conclusion: that invention is choice, that this choice is imperatively governed by the sense of scientific beauty. Hadamard (1945), Princeton University Press, by permission. The great majority of all sources and amplifiers of microwave energy, and all devices for receiving or detecting microwaves, use a semiconductor active element. The development of microwave semiconductor devices, de scribed in this book, has proceeded from the simpler, two-terminal, devices such as GUNN or IMPATT devices, which originated in the 1960s, to the sophisticated monolithic circuit MESFET three-terminal active elements, of the 1980s and 1990s. The microwave field has experienced a renais sance in electrical engineering departments in the last few years, and much of this growth has been associated with microwave semiconductor devices. The University of Massachusetts has recently developed a well recognized program in microwave engineering. Much of the momentum for this pro gram has been provided by interaction with industrial companies, and the influx of a large number of industry-supported students. This program had a need for a course in microwave semiconductor devices, which covered the physical aspects, as well as the aspects of interest to the engineer who incorporates such devices in his designs. It was also felt that it would be im portant to introduce the most recently developed devices (HFETs, HBTs, and other advanced devices) as early as possible."

Recent years have seen silicon integrated circuits enter into an increasing number of technical and consumer applications, until they now affect everyday life, as well as technical areas. Polycrystalline silicon has been an important component of silicon technology for nearly two decades, being used first in MOS integrated circuits and now becoming pervasive in bipolar circuits, as well. During this time a great deal of informa tion has been published about polysilicon. A wide range of deposition conditions has been used to form films exhibiting markedly different properties. Seemingly contradictory results can often be explained by considering the details of the structure formed. This monograph is an attempt to synthesize much of the available knowledge about polysilicon. It represents an effort to interrelate the deposition, properties, and applications of polysilicon so that it can be used most effectively to enhance device and integrated-circuit perfor mance. As device performance improves, however, some of the proper ties of polysilicon are beginning to restrict the overall performance of integrated circuits, and the basic limitations of the properties of polysili con also need to be better understood to minimize potential degradation of circuit behavior."

Traditionally, Computer Aided Design (CAD) tools have been used to create the nominal design of an integrated circuit (IC), such that the circuit nominal response meets the desired performance specifications. In reality, however, due to the disturbances ofthe IC manufacturing process, the actual performancesof the mass produced chips are different than those for the nominal design. Even if the manufacturing process were tightly controlled, so that there were little variations across the chips manufactured, the environmentalchanges (e. g. those oftemperature, supply voltages, etc. ) would alsomakethe circuit performances vary during the circuit life span. Process-related performance variations may lead to low manufacturing yield, and unacceptable product quality. For these reasons, statistical circuit design techniques are required to design the circuit parameters, taking the statistical process variations into account. This book deals with some theoretical and practical aspects of IC statistical design, and emphasizes how they differ from those for discrete circuits. It de scribes a spectrum of different statistical design problems, such as parametric yield optimization, generalized on-target design, variability minimization, per formance tunning, and worst-case design. The main emphasis of the presen tation is placed on the principles and practical solutions for performance vari ability minimization. It is hoped that the book may serve as an introductory reference material for various groups of IC designers, and the methodologies described will help them enhance the circuit quality and manufacturability. The book containsseven chapters."

An international team of experts describes the optical and electronic properties of semiconductors and semiconductor nanostructures at picosecond and femtosecond time scales. The contributions cover the latest research on a wide range of topics. In particular they include novel experimental techniques for studying and characterizing nanostructure materials. The contributions are written in a tutorial way so that not only researchers in the field but also researchers and graduate students outside the field can benefit.

This book offers a comprehensive overview of the development, current state, and future prospects of wide bandgap semiconductor materials and related optoelectronics devices. With 901 references, 333 figures and 21 tables, this book will serve as a one-stop source of knowledge on wide bandgap semiconductors and related optoelectronics devices.

The tremendous impact of electronic devices on our lives is the result of continuous improvements of the billions of nanoelectronic components inside integrated circuits (ICs). However, ultra-scaled semiconductor devices require nanometer control of the many parameters essential for their fabrication. Through the years, this created a strong alliance between microscopy techniques and IC manufacturing. This book reviews the latest progress in IC devices, with emphasis on the impact of electrical atomic force microscopy (AFM) techniques for their development. The operation principles of many techniques are introduced, and the associated metrology challenges described. Blending the expertise of industrial specialists and academic researchers, the chapters are dedicated to various AFM methods and their impact on the development of emerging nanoelectronic devices. The goal is to introduce the major electrical AFM methods, following the journey that has seen our lives changed by the advent of ubiquitous nanoelectronics devices, and has extended our capability to sense matter on a scale previously inaccessible.

This book describes the characterization of liquid crystal materials at microwave frequencies and the usage of these materials in reconfigurable planar antennas and in their electrical tunable components. It reports for the first time the realization of a two-dimensional electronic beam steering antenna and polarization agile planar antennas with liquid crystal display technology. It gives a detailed description of all the theoretical analyses, modeling and design methods that were involved in the realization of these devices as well as their validation using measurement of demonstrative prototypes. This book also shows that low profile, low cost, high gain, electronic beam steering and polarization agile antennas can be fabricated in larger sizes by using existing automated liquid crystal display manufacturing techniques. The innovative ideas and method described in this work represent a considerable advancement in the field of electronically reconfigurable antennas based on liquid crystal technology and are expected to draw significant interest in the future. Such antennas may become important, for example, in mobile terminals integrated into the body of laptops (in the cover) or of automobiles (in the rooftop), ships or boats, for which flat, low-profile and low-cost antennas are required.

This seriesofbooks, which is publishedattherateofaboutoneper year, addresses fundamental problems in materialsscience.Thecontents coverabroadrangeoftopicsfromsmallclustersofatomstoengineering materials and involve chemistry, physics, materials science, and engineering,withlengthscalesrangingfromAngstromsuptomillimeters. Theemphasis is on basic scienceratherthan on applications. Each book focuses on a single areaofcurrent interest and brings together leading experts to give an up-to-date discussion oftheir work and the workof others. Each articlecontainsenough references thattheinterestedreader can access the relevant literature. Thanks are given to the Center for Fundamental Materials Research at Michigan State University for supportingthisseries. M.F.Thorpe,SeriesEditor E-mail:[email protected] EastLansing,Michigan,November2002 v PREFACE ThisvolumerecordsinvitedlecturesgivenattheNewThermoelectric(TE)Materials Workshopheld inTraverseCity,MichiganfromAugust17-21,2002.Thethemeofthe workshop was Chemistry, PhysicsandMaterials ScienceofThermoelectric Materials: Beyond Bismuth Telluride. The objective of this symposium was threefold. First, to examine and assess the ability of solid state chemistry to produce new generation materials for TE applications. Second, to rationalize and predict the charge and heat transportpropertiesofpotentialcandidatesandhypotheticalsystemsthroughsolidstate theoryandexperiment.Third,toidentifyandprioritizeresearchneededtoreachvarious levelsofrequirementsintermsofZTandtemperature.Theseobjectiveswereaddressed by a series of invited talks and discussions by leading experts from academia, governmentlaboratories,andindustry. Thereweretwenty-twoinvitedandeightposterpresentations inthe workshop.Out ofthese,sixteeninvitedpresentationsarerepresentedinthisvolume.Theycoverawide range of subjects, starting from synthesis (based on different strategies) and characterizationofnovel materials to acareful studyoftheir transport properties and electronicstructure.Topicsaddressingtheissueofmakingnew materialsare: synthetic search for new materials (di Salvo et aI.) and synthetic strategies based on phase homologies (Kanatzidis). The different classes of materials covered are: bismuth nanowires (Dresselhausetal.), unconventional high-temperaturethermoelectrics, boron carbides (Aselage et aI.) , layered cobalt oxides (Fujii et aI.), early transition metal antimonides(KleinkeetaI.),skutterudites(Uher),andclathratethermoelectrics(Nolas).

Semiconductor materials have been studied intensively since the birth of silicon technology more than 50 years ago. The ability to physically and chemically t- lor their properties with precision is the key factor responsible for the electronic revolution in our society over the past few decades. Semiconductor material s- tems (like silicon and GaAs-related materials) have now matured and found well established applications in electronics, optoelectronics, and several other ?elds. Other materials such as III-Nitrides were developed later, in response to needs that the above mentioned semiconductors were unable to ful?ll. The properties of I- nitrides (AlN, GaN InN, and related alloy systems) make them an excellent choice for ef?cient light emitters in the visible as well as the UV region, UV detectors, and for a variety of electronic device such as high frequency unipolar power devices. There was a major upsurgein the research of the GaN material system around1970.

The book presents the modeling and control of hydrogen-air PEM fuel cells, including simultaneous estimation of the parameters and states, fuzzy cluster modeling, SPM-based predictive control and advanced fuzzy control. MATLAB/Simulink-based modeling and control programs are discussed in detail. With simulations and experiments, it is an essential reference for both scientists and industrial engineers.

This book covers different aspects of the physics of iron-based superconductors ranging from the theoretical, the numerical and computational to the experimental ones. It starts from the basic theory modeling many-body physics in Fe-superconductors and other multi-orbital materials and reaches up to the magnetic and Cooper pair fluctuations and nematic order. Finally, it offers a comprehensive overview of the most recent advancements in the experimental investigations of iron based superconductors.

The Physical Electronics Department of SRI International (formerly Stanford Research Institute) has been pioneering the development of devices fabricated to submicron tolerances for well over 20 years. In 1961, a landmark paper on electron-beam lithography and its associated technologies was published by K. R. Shoulderst (then at SRI), which set the stage for our subsequent efforts in this field. He had the foresight to believe that the building of such small devices was actually within the range of human capabilities. As a result of this initial momentum, our experience in the technologies associated with microfabrication has become remarkably comprehensive, despite the relatively small size of our research activity. We have frequently been asked to deliver seminars or provide reviews on various aspects of micro fabrication. These activities made us aware of the need for a comprehensive overview of the physics of microfabrication. We hope that this book will fill that need."

This title introduces state-of-the-art design principles for SOI circuit design, and is primarily concerned with circuit-related issues. It considers SOI material in terms of implementation that is promising or has been used elsewhere in circuit development, with historical perspective where appropriate.

This book analyses different A/D-converter architectures with an emphasis on the maximum achievable power efficiency. It also provides an accessible overview of the state-of-the art in calibration techniques for Nyquist A/D converters. The calibration techniques presented are applicable to other analog-to-digital systems, such as those applied in integrated receivers. They allow implementation without introducing a speed or power penalty.

Silicon on Insulator is more than a technology, more than a job, and more than a venture in microelectronics; it is something different and refreshing in device physics. This book recalls the activity and enthu siasm of our SOl groups. Many contributing students have since then disappeared from the SOl horizon. Some of them believed that SOl was the great love of their scientific lives; others just considered SOl as a fantastic LEGO game for adults. We thank them all for kindly letting us imagine that we were guiding them. This book was very necessary to many people. SOl engineers will certainly be happy: indeed, if the performance of their SOl components is not always outstanding, they can now safely incriminate the relations given in the book rather than their process. Martine, Gunter, and Y. S. Chang can contemplate at last the amount of work they did with the figures. Our SOl accomplices already know how much we borrowed from their expertise and would find it indecent to have their detailed contri butions listed. Jean-Pierre and Dimitris incited the book, while sharing their experience in the reliability of floating bodies. Our families and friends now realize the SOl capability of dielectrically isolating us for about two years in a BOX. Our kids encouraged us to start writing. Our wives definitely gave us the courage to stop writing. They had a hard time fighting the symptoms of a rapidly developing SOl allergy."

Testing techniques for VLSI circuits are undergoing many exciting changes. The predominant method for testing digital circuits consists of applying a set of input stimuli to the IC and monitoring the logic levels at primary outputs. If, for one or more inputs, there is a discrepancy between the observed output and the expected output then the IC is declared to be defective. A new approach to testing digital circuits, which has come to be known as IDDQ testing, has been actively researched for the last fifteen years. In IDDQ testing, the steady state supply current, rather than the logic levels at the primary outputs, is monitored. Years of research suggests that IDDQ testing can significantly improve the quality and reliability of fabricated circuits. This has prompted many semiconductor manufacturers to adopt this testing technique, among them Philips Semiconductors, Ford Microelectronics, Intel, Texas Instruments, LSI Logic, Hewlett-Packard, SUN microsystems, Alcatel, and SGS Thomson. This increase in the use of IDDQ testing should be of interest to three groups of individuals associated with the IC business: Product Managers and Test Engineers, CAD Tool Vendors and Circuit Designers. Introduction to IDDQ Testing is designed to educate this community. The authors have summarized in one volume the main findings of more than fifteen years of research in this area.

The topic of this monograph is the physical modeling of heterostructure devices. A detailed discussion of physical models and parameters for compound semiconductors is presented including the relevant aspects of modern submicron heterostructure devices. More than 25 simulation examples for different types of Si(Ge)-based, GaAs-based, InP-based, and GaN-based heterostructure bipolar transistors (HBTs) and high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) are given in comparison with experimental data from state-of-the-art devices.

The last decade has witnessed the discovery of, and dramatic progress in understanding the physics of graphene and related two-dimensional materials. The development of methods for manufacturing and aligning high-quality two-dimensional crystals has facilitated the creation of a new generation of materials: the heterostructures of graphene with hexagonal crystals, in which the graphene electrons acquire new, qualitatively different properties. This thesis provides a comprehensive theoretical framework in which to understand these heterostructures, based on the tight binding model, perturbation theory, group theory and the concept of the moire superlattice (all of which are elucidated). It explains how graphene heterostructures provide new opportunities for tailoring band structure, such as creating additional Dirac points or opening band gaps and how they manifest themselves in transport measurements, optical absorption spectra and the fractal Hofstadter spectra. Also considered are the heterostructures of bilayer graphene and resonant tunneling in aligned graphene/insulator/graphene devices.

Nowadays information technology is based on semiconductor and ferromagnetic materials. Information processing and computation are based on electron charge in semiconductor transistors and integrated circuits, and information is stored on magnetic high-density hard disks based on the physics of the electron spins. Recently, a new branch of physics and nanotechnology, called magneto-electronics, spintronics, or spin electronics, has emerged, which aims at simultaneously exploiting both the charge and the spin of electrons in the same device. A broader goal is to develop new functionality that does not exist separately in a ferromagnet or a semiconductor. The aim of this book is to present new directions in the development of spin electronics in both the basic physics and the technology which will become the foundation of future electronics.