- #1
Alexander Bourdeau
I have a pressing question, but I don't exactly know how best to articulate, or where. I am a wafer fab operator in the semiconductor industry. I usually operate ion implanters. The highest energy ion beams we use are a little over 3.5 MeV. As an aside, I am looking for a way, given that, to calculate the percentage of the speed of light at which the ions are traveling.
I have a much bigger question. When particle accelerators were first being built and studied, I doubt that it occurred to any of the first-gen builders and researchers that their machines would soon be used to embed dopants into silicon substrate to modify its electrical properties. Perhaps I'm mistaken; it just seems more likely that implant was a next-gen development.
Higher beam energies allow dopants to be deeply embedded into the substrate, which allowed engineers to bypass a few earlier semiconductor design steps, which translates into huge cost savings. Now, my billion-dollar question; does anyone savvy here have any idea if any design work is being done to capitalize on much, much higher beam energies - at speeds where relativistic effects become significant? Any ideas what those sorts of relativistic effects may practically mean in this context?
I'm out of time, but I'll leave it at that in hopes that someone here groks what I'm getting at.
Cheers!
~X
I have a much bigger question. When particle accelerators were first being built and studied, I doubt that it occurred to any of the first-gen builders and researchers that their machines would soon be used to embed dopants into silicon substrate to modify its electrical properties. Perhaps I'm mistaken; it just seems more likely that implant was a next-gen development.
Higher beam energies allow dopants to be deeply embedded into the substrate, which allowed engineers to bypass a few earlier semiconductor design steps, which translates into huge cost savings. Now, my billion-dollar question; does anyone savvy here have any idea if any design work is being done to capitalize on much, much higher beam energies - at speeds where relativistic effects become significant? Any ideas what those sorts of relativistic effects may practically mean in this context?
I'm out of time, but I'll leave it at that in hopes that someone here groks what I'm getting at.
Cheers!
~X