The Ohio State University is set to play a key role in strengthening the U.S. microelectronics supply chain by advancing domestic chip development and production.
Midwest Microelectronics Consortium (MMEC) has announced Ohio State will lead a collaboration with industry and government partners to support one of five prototype projects across six technical areas critical to the U.S. Department of Defense as part of the Microeletronics Commons initiative.
The project called the Center for Technology Transition and Rapid Prototyping of Infrared Detectors (CENTROID) focuses on electromagnetic warfare and will be led by Sanjay Krishna, Ohio State professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and George R. Smith Chair in Engineering in the College of Engineering. He leads the Krishna Infrared Detector (KIND) lab that undertakes academic research on infrared semiconductor materials and detectors to educate, train and develop the next generation of scientists, engineers and thought leaders.
“Under Dr. Krishna’s leadership, The Ohio State University has become a recognized leader in Electro-Optical/InfraRed (EO/IR) research and technology development,” said Peter Mohler, executive vice president for the Enterprise for Research, Innovation, and Knowledge at Ohio State. “We are pleased to co-lead one of the first round of projects supported through DOD’s new Microelectronics Commons initiative in partnership with the MMEC hub and in concert with our small business partners.”
At Ohio State, CENTROID will utilize the Microelectronics Innovation and Technology Cluster (MITEC), which is a core part of the MMEC hub infrastructure, operated by the Institute for Materials and Manufacturing Research.
“Development of the infrared focal plane arrays led by the CENTROID team represents a very critical technology for the Department of Defense,” Krishna said. “Our team will undertake critical research to explore novel heterogenous integration approaches for antimonide based semiconductors with silicon.”
The university will collaborate with industry partners Attollo Engineering, IQE USA, SK Infrared and Senseeker Engineering, as well as the U.S. Navy Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division. Other MMEC projects will focus on research and development of 5G/6G, artificial intelligence, and graphics processing units.
Supported by the CHIPS and Science Act, the Microelectronics Commons program is a network of regional technology hubs aimed at strengthening the U.S.’s global leadership in microelectronics. MMEC, based in Dayton, leads the acceleration of microelectronic technologies and delivers solutions to establish a trusted and resilient domestic supply chain.
“The MMEC was formed to identify opportunities and build collaboration between members to accelerate microelectronics innovation. It was impressive to see how the project teams leveraged MMECs role-based hub model to produce 15 very high-quality proposals. Being awarded five projects really speaks to the talent and expertise of our members and the MMEC team” said MMEC chief technology officer, Matt Casto PhD. “I am confident these projects will be successfully executed and will ultimately be a huge benefit to the US and the warfighter.”
Story by IMR communications coordinator Mike Huson. Contact: huson.4@osu.edu.
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