Carleton University’s Microelectronics Fabrication Laboratory (MFL) provides important supportive technology to Carleton Aerospace. This facility manufactures silicon integrated circuits and devices in support of research on process technology, device physics and modelling, innovative circuit techniques, photonics, biomedical devices, and microelectromechanical systems (MEMS).
This laboratory is unique as it may be the only one in Canadian Universities that enables undergraduate students to design, fabricate, and test silicon integrated circuits using our own facilities. It is well-equipped for semiconductor device modeling and characterization and on-wafer testing.
Specific Aerospace applications include antennae and electromagnetic wave testing for wireless communications such as radar, navigation, and satellite communications. The microchips produced in the labs are also used for creating sensors and for the circuitry that drive antennas.
The facility was opened in 1993 as part of the new Minto Center for Advanced Studies in Engineering.