News: Suppliers
3 September 2024
Element Six to lead US DARPA-funded Ultra-Wide BandGap Semiconductors program
Chemical vapor deposition (CVD)-based synthetic diamond materials firm Element Six of Oxford, UK (E6, part of the De Beers Group) is leading a program under the UWBGS (Ultra-Wide BandGap Semiconductors) initiative, established by the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), to enable the next generation of semiconductor technologies.
Through the UWBGS program, DARPA’s Microsystems Technology Office has stated its goal to develop high-quality ultrawide-bandgap (UWBG) materials, such as substrates, device layers, and junctions. These materials are key to realizing advanced electronics, including high-power RF switches, amplifiers for radar and communications, high-voltage power switches, high-temperature electronics for extreme environments, and deep-ultraviolet (UV) LEDs and lasers, underpinning a multi-billion dollar system market.
Diamond offers the potential for semiconductor device performance that reduces overall size, weight and power consumption (SWaP) thanks to properties such as its chemical and radiation inertness, high carrier mobility, heat conduction, and wide electronic bandgap.
E6’s contribution to the UWBGS program will harness its expertise in large-area CVD polycrystalline diamond and high-quality single-crystal (SC) diamond synthesis to realize 4-inch device-grade SC diamond substrates.
“Industrial diamond has disrupted multiple markets since its first scale synthesis in the 1950s, and I am confident that technology breakthroughs in UWBGS will help unlock another 70 years of opportunities in the semiconductor industry,” says professor Daniel Twitchen, chief technologist at Element Six.
Element Six’s SC diamond was already a crucial enabler in the CERN Large Hadron Collider’s monitoring systems, helping lead to the discovery of the Higgs-Boson particle. In partnership with high-power semiconductor firm ABB, E6 realized the first high-voltage bulk diamond-based Schottky diodes. Furthermore, it recently completed the build and commission of an advanced CVD facility, leveraging its core technology in Portland, OR, USA, powered by renewable energy sources.
E6’s polycrystalline diamond wafers measuring >4-inches are already enabling telecom infrastructures and defence applications, used as either optical windows in EUV lithography for state-of-the-art silicon chips, or in thermal management applications for high-power density silicon and gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductor devices.
For the UWBGS program, Element Six has partnered with other leaders in the field from across the globe, including Orbray in Japan (with large-area diamond expertise ), Raytheon (leaders in GaN RF devices), Hiqute Diamond in France (with dislocation engineering expertise), and Stanford and Princeton Universities in the USA (with materials bulk and surface processing characterization expertise). Through the collaboration of this global network, UWBGS is expected to push the boundaries of diamond innovation to enable a new generation of ultrawide-bandgap semiconductors.
Element Six and Orbray partner to deliver high-quality wafer-scale single-crystal synthetic diamond
Element Six selected for US Department of Defense LADDIS program
