Originally Posted by
JumpingJack
You may ask :) ...
I work for a private R&D firm as a staff senior scientist, i.e. we contract out 'slave' R&D labor so to speak. Well, not quite that. Some companies run into tough problems that requires a short burst of R&D effort, however, those problems are few between or are not numerous enough to justify implementing a full R&D staff and associated equipment. So they hand us a problem (and money) to answer very specific questions for them.
My background rests with advanced degrees in chemistry and physics. One dissertation involved studying the gas/solid interfacial surface chemistry of small molecules on Si(100) -- the technologically relevant surface of silicon. I also did some optical studies with Ge on Si(100) and SiGe heterostructures. In fact, I got my degrees at UT Austin, and some of my interactions included working with AMD staff scientist and Motorola staff scientists/engineers. I even took an senior level EE course (not fun) from the professor who authors pretty much the standard text on VLSI CMOS devices (Ben Streetman), this is really where I learned alot of the basics.
While working through graduate school I had thought about a career in the microelectronics, but the way it panned out -- nah... I get paid nicely for what I do and the hours are not horrid, I do have a few friends (long lost touch with) that did wind up in smaller companies -- Triquent is one.
Anyway, computer building, playing around, studying has been my hobby for the better part of 16 (check that 18, darn I am getting old) years, with all this high octane education, and since my job requires the better part of 20+ hours per week in libraries searching for would be answers :) ... I find time to also catch the technical engineering literature on these topics or professional magazines which publish things like 'ooooh, look how cool this could revolutionize the industry', which never pan out.
If you are interested in learning more about the way these wonderful devices are made -- I do suggest Ben Streetman's book "Solid State Electronic Devices" ... it is a Senior/1st yr graduate student level book but goes through most of the basic processing concepts as well as most of the fundamental device physics.
