Facilities

Our state-of-the-art equipment and modern facilities enable researchers and industry to work together.

The Institute provides full-scale industrially relevant shared facilities to enable researchers and industry to meet research and exploitation demands.

Refurbished cleanroom

To meet current demand, we have upgraded an existing 225 square metre cleanroom in Cardiff University’s Queen’s Buildings, a grade II listed building that also houses the University’s Schools of Physics and Astronomy, Engineering, and Computer Science and Informatics.

During 2017, the Queen's Buildings cleanroom has undergone a £600,000 refurbishment to improve room conditioning and provide necessary services required for the installation of new equipment. The programme has included upgrading:

• temperature and humidity control
• compressed dry air supply
• vacuum
• liquid nitrogen supply
• process gas extract and scrubbing
• ozone extract
• electrical power supplies.

In addition to the cleanroom upgrade, the Institute of Compound Semiconductors (ICS) has, with support from both the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and the Welsh Government via European Regional Development Funds, invested in new equipment to bring a small area to 6-inch fabrication capability online.

Along with our cleanroom, we also house a characterization lab over one large floor, and a breakout space where physicists and Institute staff meet to share ideas.

Latest equipment

Equipment purchased in 2017/18 includes:

• Lesker PRO Line™ PVD 200™ THIN FILM DEPOSITION SYSTEM
• Lesker PRO Line™ PVD 200™ THIN FILM DEPOSITION SYSTEM with UHV loadlock
• Buhler Boxer Dielecric Evaporator
• AET Wet Oxidation (AlOx) Furnace
• Oxford Instruments PlasmaPro 100 Cobra 300 Plasma Etch Tool
• Jipelec JetFirst 300 RTP Processor
• Plasma Etch Inc. PE-100 Plasma Asher
• SÜSS MicroTec MA6 Mask Aligner
• Bruker DektakXT Advanced System (DXT-A)
• Beneq TFS 200 Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) System.

New facility in development

We are currently building a state-of-the-art 8-inch fabrication line that will be housed in the new Translational Research Facility (TRF), where we will relocate to a new, purpose built cleanroom facility.

This is part of Cardiff University’s new £300 million Innovation Campus, set to combine cutting-edge research, technology transfer, business development and student enterprise.

Learn more about the new facility.

Contact

For more information about our facilities, please contact: