Trevor Thornton
Arizona State University Campus Immersion, AZ·Materials Science
Building anything at the scale of billionths of a meter requires tools most labs cannot buy on their own: cleanrooms, electron microscopes, and fabrication equipment that cost millions. The Nanotechnology Collaborative Infrastructure Southwest (NCI-SW) exists to open that toolset to outside users, pairing equipment access with faculty expertise and staff training so that researchers, companies and students across the region can design, make and measure nanoscale materials and devices.
- Fields
Materials Science
Engineering
Physics
- Topics
nanotechnology
nanofabrication
cleanroom
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Feb 2027
What they work on
- Provide open external access to three core facilities spanning semiconductor device, sensor and micro-electro-mechanical systems fabrication, advanced electron microscopy and materials characterization, and bio-synthetic nanomaterials.
- Open a compact x-ray free electron laser (CXFEL) to the national nanotechnology user community, enabling study of semiconductors, quantum materials and nano-bio systems at timescales and energies otherwise needing a synchrotron.
- Train nanotechnology technicians through advanced laboratory classes for community college students, including remote online operation of a scanning electron microscope and recruitment into summer research experiences.
- Study the societal and ethical implications of nanotechnology with social scientists, and run the Science Outside the Lab program to teach science policy decision making to emerging nanotechnologists.
More about the research
It is a site in the National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure (NNCI) network, based on the campuses of Arizona State University and Northern Arizona University.
Why it matters
Open access to nanofabrication and characterization equipment lets small companies, startups and researchers without their own cleanrooms develop sensors, semiconductor devices and nanomaterials, supporting low-volume manufacturing and new industries. Training programs aimed at community college students, including Hispanic and Native American students, build a technician workforce, while the social science component could give policymakers better evidence on nanotechnology's societal effects.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Junhua Xin
Butler County Community College, PA·Education Research
Develop a lab manual of low-cost, hands-on nanofabrication experiments that closely represent chipmaking industry methods, designed for community colleges that lack cleanrooms and fabrication equipment.
Haifeng Zhang
University of North Texas, TX·Engineering
Design, fabricate and test a MEMS resonant sensor on a piezoelectric single-crystal wafer that measures pH, pressure and temperature together. The goal is sensitive pH readings that do not drift with depth-related changes.
Mark Wiesner
Duke University, NC·Earth & Environmental Science
Coordinate international studies on particle-based delivery systems for nutrients and pesticides in agriculture, materials used in transportation, and advanced materials for water treatment and resource recovery.
The school
Arizona State University Campus Immersion: 36 labs on PI Pages, $1.0B a year on research, 625 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
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