Ian Baxendale

Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom

Dr Ian R. Baxendale of the University of Cambridge co-founded the Innovative Technology Centre (ITC) as a centre of excellence for the study and development of advanced chemical synthesis tools and methodologies. In 2009 he became a Royal Society University Research Fellow at Cambridge. He specialises in the design and implementation of enabling technologies such as flow chemical synthesis, microwave reactors and immobilised reagents and scavengers to expedite complex chemical transformations.

Applying Pragmatism to Flow Chemistry

During the last few years there has been a steady growth in interest within the chemical community for flow chemistry approaches to synthetic targets due to inherent benefits such as automated and telescoped reaction sequences, quick reaction optimisations and in-line work-ups and purifications. Consequently, flow chemistry addresses both environmental and economic drivers. However, conducting flow chemistry requires changes in synthesis planning and execution and so we should be careful to determine the true the benefits and assess the worth of altering current working practice. This talk will focus on some of the benefits that can be realised using flow chemical processing using examples conducted in our laboratories.

 Joris Dik

Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands

Miko Elwenspoek

FRIAS, University of Freiburg, Germany
and
MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands

Miko Elwenspoek is professor in transducers science and technology at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, University of Twente. The research of his group is on industrial applications of MEMS and on functional 3-dimensisional micro- en nanostructures.  He is co-author of several books, coach of more than 35 PhD students, and (co)author of ca. 500 scientific papers and conference contributions. He is enthusiastic on teaching on academic level and repeatedly elected by his students as the best lecturer in their program.

Challenges and Prospects of Self-Assembly for Microtechnology

We review aspects of static self-assembly in view of synthesizing new types of three-dimensional materials and systems made of specifically designed particles in the 100 nm – 10 µm range. We demonstrate that mechanical interconnection technologies based on static friction used in the assembly of macroscopic systems (such as screws and nails) is unsuitable for self-assembly. We discuss at some length how interaction and dynamic properties scale with the particle size. Chains of particles seem to us of particular importance, since they might form three-dimensional structures similar to proteins constrained by the order of the particles when they are designed to have specific interaction with the solvent as well as among themselves. Finally we review some applications of self-assembly, notably in MEMS, and put forward some ideas for the assembly of new types of (smart) supermaterials with interesting optical, mechanical, electrical and magnetic properties and describe some of the technological challenges we are faced with when realizing these materials. 

 Jeff Hilbert

WiSpry, Irvine, USA

Jeff Hilbert is founder of the company, bringing over 35 years of executive management and technical experience in a number of leading semiconductor and MEMS companies including LSI Logic, Compass Design Automation, AMCC, Motorola, Harris and Coventor. Hilbert holds a bachelor of science in chemical engineering from the University of Florida and master of science in computer science from Florida Institute of Technology.

Integrated RF-CMOS MEMS for Wireless Applications
Concept to Commercialization – the Ten Year Journey

Rapidly emerging wireless applications have intensified requirements for new, disruptive technology to implement next generation mobile hardware particularly in the RF front-end.  RF-MEMS is one such technology. 

The challenges, opportunities, and lessons learned during a decade-long effort to integrate and commercialize RF-CMOS MEMS technology in a venture capital financed start-up will be presented.  Results from the implementation of software tunable, digital, RF-MEMS circuits in 180nm CMOS will be discussed from the perspectives of process, device, and product technology integration.  Future research directions and product applications will also be presented.

Johan Hofkens

Laboratory of Photochemistry and Spectroscopy of the Department of Chemistry of K.U.Leuven, Belgium

Single Molecule Based Super Resolution; Applications in Biochemistry/Biophysics

Optical spectroscopy at the ultimate limit of a single molecule has grown over the past years into a powerful technique for exploring the individual nano-scale behavior of molecules in complex local environments. Observing a single molecule removes the usual ensemble average, allowing the exploration of hidden heterogeneity in complex condensed phases as well as direct observation of dynamic changes, without synchronization.
Crucially dependent on fluorescent probes, the performance of any form of fluorescence microscopy (and especially of single molecule microscopy) is largely dependent on the labeling molecules and methods. Fluorescent proteins (FPs) revolutionized biological imaging by allowing the genetic labeling of any protein in its natural environment, and have proven to be wildly successful and indispensable in modern life science research.
In this lecture, I will give an overview of our strategies to develop new and more performant photoswitchable fluorophores for super resolution microscopy. The application of these fluorophores as well as new probes based om then will be examplified by recent work on rafts, viruses and DNA mapping.

David Holden

4-LABS, Geneva, Switzerland

David Holden is Business Development Director at 4-Labs, Switzerland, a service company created by CEA (France), Fraunhofer-Verbund Mikroelektronik (Germany) , CSEM (Switserland), and VTT (Finland). Holden worked in the area of display technology for PixTech (France) , Robert Bosch (Germany), and Advanced Vision Technologies (USA). In 2002 he joined CEA in Grenoble as Strategic Marketing Manager for Minatec. David Holden holds a B.S. in materials engineering from Cornell University and an MBA from INSEAD.

Novel Instruments for Water Analysis – Making a Business Case

New capabilities in instrumentation are made possible by the miniaturization of analytical components and systems. The Waterbox prototype developed jointly by VTT, Fraunhofer, CSEM and CEA Leti, combines silicon based microfluidics, miniaturized optical measurements, fluid separation/extraction and a micro gas chromatography column for mobile water analysis in a compact portable system. The business case analysis and market strategy will be presented as an example of how technology must adapt to market constraints in order to be successful. 

 Diederik Samsom

Member of the Dutch House of Representatives for the Labour Party

Zhong Lin Wang

School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, USA

Dr. Zhong Lin (ZL) Wang is a Professor and Director, Center for Nanostructure Characterization, at Georgia Tech. Dr. Wang has made original and profound contributions to the synthesis, discovery, characterization and understanding of fundamental physical properties of oxide nanobelts and nanowires, as well as applications of nanowires. He initiated, coined and pioneered the field of piezotronics and piezo-phototronics by introducing piezoelectric potential gated charge transport process in fabricating new electronic and optoelectronic devices.

Nanogenerators for Self-Powered Sensors and Piezotronics for Smart Systems

Developing wireless nanodevices and nanosystems is of critical importance for sensing, medical science, environmental/infrastructure monitoring, defense technology and even personal electronics. It is highly desirable for wireless devices to be self-powered without using battery. This is a new initiative in today’s energy research for mico/nano-systems in searching for sustainable self-sufficient power sources [1]. We have invented an innovative approach for converting nano-scale mechanical energy into electric energy by piezoelectric zinc oxide nanowire arrays [2]. As today, a gentle straining can output 1-3 V from an integrated nanogenerator, using which a self-powered nanosensor has been demonstrated. A commercial LED has been lid up [3-5].

Due to the polarization of ions in a crystal that has non-central symmetry, a piezoelectric potential (piezopotential) is created in the crystal by applying a stress. The effect of piezopotential to the transport behavior of charge carriers is significant due to their multiple functionalities of piezoelectricity, semiconductor and photon excitation. Electronics fabricated by using inner-crystal piezopotential as a “gate” voltage to tune/control the charge transport behavior is named piezotronics [6,7].Piezo-phototronic effect is a result of three-way coupling among piezoelectricity, photonic excitation and semiconductor transport, which allows tuning and controlling of electro-optical processes by strain induced piezopotential.

[1] Z.L. Wang, Scientific American, 298 (2008) 82-87; [2] Z.L. Wang and J.H. Song , Science, 312 (2006) 242; [3] R.S. Yang, Y. Qin, L.M. Dai and Z.L. Wang , Nature Nanotechnology, 4 (2009) 34; [4] S. Xu, Y. Qin, C. Xu et al., Nature Nanotechnology, 5 (2010) 366; [5] G. Zhu, R.S. Yang, S.H. Wang, and Z.L. Wang , Nano Letters, 10 (2010) 3151; [6] Z.L. Wang,  Nano Today 5 (2010) 540; [7] W.Z. Wu, Y.G. Wei and Zhong Lin Wang , Adv. Materials, DOI: adma.201001925; [8] Y.F. Hu et al., ACS Nano, 4 (2010) 1234.

Ronald Zengerle

Director Department of Microsystems Engineering - IMTEK University of Freiburg, Germany

Prof. Dr. Roland Zengerle is director of the Department of Microsystems Engineering (IMTEK) at the University of Freiburg, as well as director of the Institut für Mikro- und Informationstechnik of the Hahn-Schickard-Gesellschaft (HSG-IMIT) in Villingen-Schwenningen, Germany. His research is focused on microfluidics and specialises in lab-on-a-chip systems, nanoliter & picoliter dispensing, miniaturized and implantable drug delivery systems, bio fuel cells as well as micro- and nanofluidics modelling and simulation.

Microfluidic Apps for off-the-shelf Instruments

The perspective to automate and miniaturize assays or whole laboratories by using microfluidics or lab-on-a-chip devices led to a large research boom in microfluidics over the last two decades. However, only a limited number of commercially available devices surfaced from this boom so far. In our view, one aspect that impedes market uptake is the proprietary, complex, and expensive instrumentation that is often required to operate every microfluidic chip. This approach is costly and also contributes much to the development risk. In contrast, here we present a different solution that we call the microfluidic “Apps” approach: Microfluidic chips that are designed to operate as “Apps” on instruments already present in standard labs, thus potentially reducing the costs for lab automation to disposable plastic test carriers.

As a first example we report about the “PipeJet Tip technology” which is based on modified pipetting tips. The technology enables to convert standard laboratory workstations into nanoliter dispensing instruments. As a second example we report on microfluidic cartridges for automated DNA extraction that can be operated on standard lab centrifuges. Finally, as a third example we present microfluidic cartridges for automated genotyping that run on a standard real-time PCR cycler. We expect that our new strategy of designing microfluidic chips as “Apps” for standard instruments will push the market penetration of microfluidic devices. Extending the approach of designing microfluidics Apps will enable end-users to profit from the large potential of microfluidic system integration with very little initial investments.