Int. J. Engng Ed. Vol. 18, No. 3, pp. 369±378, 2002 0949-149X/91 $3.00+0.00 Printed in Great Britain. # 2002 TEMPUS Publications. A New Undergraduate Semiconductor Manufacturing Option in the Chemical Engineering Curriculum JANE P. CHANG Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA. E-mail: [email protected] The engineering curriculum reform in the 21st century should focus on providing students with a broad knowledge base and crosscutting programs in interdisciplinary fields including semiconductor manufacturing and nanotechnology. The traditional engineering education training is often inadequate in preparing the students for the challenges presented by this industry's dynamic environment, and insufficient to meet the employer's criteria in hiring new engineers. This paper describes a new multidisciplinary curriculum and training program at UCLA. The program provides knowledge and skills in semiconductor manufacturing through a series of courses that emphasize on the application of fundamental engineering disciplines in solid-state physics, materials science of semiconductors, and chemical processing. This new curriculum was recently accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET). INTRODUCTION 3. Electronic equipment such as digital camera, cellular phones, and direct TV. THE MICROELECTRONICS INDUSTRY has All three industries rely heavily on semiconductor evolved significantly since the invention of the 1st manufacturing; thus, along with microprocessor solid-state transistor by Bardeen, Brattain, and design and communication, Intel has clearly iden- Shockley at Bell Labs in 1947. The advances in tified semiconductor manufacturing as one of the microelectronics technology have revolutionized three key elements to its company. It is obvious the telecommunication industry; and this has that semiconductor manufacturing is one of the greatly changed the way people and nations inter- most critical components in further advancing the act and the way that they exchange information. technology. The heart of this industry is the computer chip Chemical Engineering is a discipline with a and the tiny solid-state electronic devices that it broad science and technology base, and its practice comprises. By constantly shrinking the device has led to numerous technological innovations in dimensions, ultra-large scale integrated circuits energy, environment, medicine, biotechnology, (ULSI) have become increasingly powerful, while and most recently, microelectronics. Chemical the cost per function has continued to decrease. engineers have an important role to play in semi- For example, memory cells at dimensions below conductor manufacturing, in design, operation and 130 nanometers can store gigabits of information control of the sophisticated chemical processes in computers, and quantum electronic devices that fabricate the chips. They also maintain contin- made from compound semiconductors can provide uous involvement in research and development of signal switching and amplification at speeds in new processes that are capable of making the next excess of 150 gigahertz. These technological generation of denser and denser integrated circuits. advances become possible with the use of sophis- These engineers require a knowledge of mathe- ticated chemical processes for depositing, matics, physics and chemistry that is appropriate patterning, and etching thin-film circuits onto when working with engineering materials having semiconductor surfaces. dimensions between 10 and 1000 angstroms. It is possible to categorize the microelectronics To maintain the rate of progress of innovations industry into three major components: and inventions, there is an unprecedented demand for highly educated and trained engineers in the 1. Equipment and material manufacturing that semiconductor manufacturing industry both in the enables the fabrication of IC's. United States, and throughout the world. The 2. Semiconductor device fabrication that provides demand for experienced engineers is at all degree the building blocks of commercially viable levels and has intensified with the development of equipment. revolutionary new products for the internet, computers, and for communication technologies. * Accepted 5 January 2001. Since Engineering Education is career oriented 369 370 J. Chang [1, 2], there is a need for curriculum reform to meet dents to take a prerequisite course before the dynamic changes in employment, starting at starting the laboratory course. the undergraduate degree level. This paper presents a new multidisciplinary curri- Engineers with at least a four-year college culum and training program to provide a systema- degree account for one-third of the workers in tic education for Chemical Engineering students in this industry, and there is an ever increasing Semiconductor Manufacturing and Nanotechnol- demand from government laboratories, indus- ogy. Provision of knowledge and skills occurs tries, and academia for students with specialized through a series of six courses that emphasize the training in semiconductor manufacturing. application of fundamental chemical engineering However, the traditional engineering education disciplines in solid-state physics, materials science training is often inadequate in preparing the of semiconductors, and chemical process engineer- students for the challenges presented by this ing. The curriculum has three major components: industry's dynamic environment, and insufficient to meet the employer's criteria in hiring new 1. A comprehensive curriculum in semiconductor engineers. manufacturing. Clearly, the University should provide the addi- 2. One laboratory for hands-on training in semi- tional resources necessary to change the teaching conductor device fabrication. methods used for education in materials engi- 3. An interactive website learning format that neering. It is critically important to train the provides access to students outside UCLA and students in the various scientific and technological industrial mentors. areas that are pertinent to microelectronics and The curriculum contains specialty courses on vari- nano-fabrication industries, and allow them to ous technologies used to fabricate microelectronics practice engineering principles in a laboratory devices, including, for example, chemical vapor environment with state-of-the-art experimental deposition, plasma processing, photolithography, setup. It is usual to offer specialty laboratory wet-chemical cleaning, ion implantation, silicon courses on microelectronics fabrication in Electri- oxidation, and contamination control. The instruc- cal Engineering departments throughout the tion culminates in the laboratory course: Semi- country. Consequently, students only get training conductor Processing Laboratory [10]. The in this area through courses co-listed [3] in chemi- laboratory hours provide students with hands-on cal engineering departments, or some specialty training on IC fabrication, and give them an courses such as thin film processing [4] but with opportunity to investigate new manufacturing no chemical engineering facilities. This limits the technologies. Moreover, the posting of course exposure of chemical engineering students to addi- materials and lab experiments on the website will tional courses that would further enhance their allow interactive learning outside the classroom. knowledge base. Recently, laboratory courses with emphasis on semiconductor manufacturing have been introduced into the Chemical Engineering Curricula: CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT . The Department of Chemical Engineering at The Chemical Engineering Department at Oregon State University included plasma etch- UCLA offers a wide selection of undergraduate ing and spin coating in the Unit Operations courses and five options: laboratory and teaches a course on Chemical . General chemical engineering Process Statistics as a part of an option in . Semiconductor manufacturing ``Microelectronics Processing'' [5]. Environmental engineering . The Department of Chemical Engineering at the . Bioengineering University of Illinois, (Chicago), addressed this . Biomedical engineering. concern by using the world-wide web to instruct a course on microelectronics processing [6, 7] Many undergraduate students also take advantage and provide students with flexible working of numerous graduate-level subjects and research hours and schedules. topics in their senior years. This type of exposure is . The Department of Chemical and Material invaluable in preparing them for work as chemical Engineering at the San Jose State University engineers for graduate school, industry, or govern- set up a new concentration in Microelectronics ment in chemical engineering. Process Engineering [8] to address this issue. The Department of Chemical Engineering at They require Chemical Engineering students to UCLA offers students a comprehensive curriculum take a prerequisite course before starting the in solid-state physics, materials characterization, laboratory course that focuses on cooperation semiconductor processing, and the principles of IC learning. manufacturing. The new semiconductor manufac- . The Department of Chemical Engineering at turing option is designed to provide in-depth Colorado School of Mines also has a similar knowledge of the field such as Surface and Inter- course on Interdisciplinary Microelectronics face Engineering, Electrochemical Processing, Processing Laboratory [9]. They require stu- Plasma Processing