Contact Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology
Mike & Ophelia Lazaridis Quantum-Nano Centre, Room 3606
University of Waterloo
200 University Ave. W.
Waterloo, ON. N2L 3G1
+1 519 888 4567, ext.38654
win[at]uwaterloo.ca
The Centre for Integrated Radio Frequency Engineering (CIRFE) lab is a key Micro-Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) facility in Canada established by Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology member, Raafat Mansour. Established in 1999 with funds from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI), Ontario Innovation Trust (OIT) and COM DEV, the CIRFE houses a class of 10,000 clean rooms and a characterization laboratory for radio frequency MEMS devices.
The uniqueness of the facility stems from the fact that it is one of the few clean room facilities that is designed to use metals such as gold and silver. While gold is necessary in making high performance low-loss MEMS, gold is known to contaminate microelectronic thin film processes. None of the clean facilities at University of Waterloo or nearby universities permit the use of gold in their equipment. The ability to use gold films is a key feature that is so important to many researchers who need to use such type of films for their devices.
Capabilities and Equipment
The focus of the CIRFE research activities is on emerging Radio Frequency (RF) technologies including RF Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS), miniature Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), wireless intelligent systems, filters and multiplexers, superconductivity, novel materials, computer-aided circuit diagnosis, simulation, and modeling. The uniqueness of the CIRFE lies in the ability to integrate various RF technologies and in its wide range of capabilities, which include research, development, modeling, design, fabrication, packaging, and testing.