Our group is interested in making electronic systems that have a form
factor appropriate to their application. With a few notable
(and
significant) exceptions, modern electronics solves--and solves
well--problems that can be funneled into and extracted from chips.
This has served many of the electronic, sensing, and
optoelectronic applications that have powered the revolution in
electronics over the past 40 or so years.
There is a class of problems, however, which are not especially well
addressed by the traditional silicon infrastructure; especially
circuits that need to be large, flexible, non-planar, or grown directly
on materials which cannot tolerate high processing temperatures.
Our primary strategy to addressing these needs is to use low
temperature fabricated thin film optoelectronic and electronic devices
integrated into complex systems.
Our group is very hands-on and builds most of its devices and systems
in our laboratory and in collaboration with other partners.
There are three major research themes:
-Thin film electronic devices; including fabrication processes, the
physics of operation, characterization, and modeling
-Systems made with these devices; including novel applications and
device systems
-The use of sophisticated processing techniques to achieve challenging
fabrication goals; both in thin film electronics and in other material
systems