Rice brings together leading researchers to accelerate next-generation microelectronics

Technology is a powerful driver of change, and next-generation electronics are a focal point for efforts to enable future advancements. As part of helping lead those efforts, the Rice Advanced Materials Institute (RAMI) hosted a signature workshop centered on advanced microelectronics and photonics materials, one of the institute’s foundational research themes.

The inaugural session of the event brought together more than 120 researchers, industry experts and students Nov. 3-4, serving as a dynamic platform for sharing recent advancements, fostering creative ideas and defining new research directions. The event featured leading voices in materials synthesis, advanced characterization, integration and device design — four areas critical to ensuring the United States remains at the forefront of semiconductor innovation.

The workshop, organized by Lane Martin, the Robert A. Welch Professor of Materials Science and director of RAMI, along with Hae Yeon Lee and Xuedan Ma, both faculty in Rice’s Department of Materials Science and NanoEngineering, showcased the university’s expanding impact in the microelectronics ecosystem.

“The future of microelectronics depends on how well we can design, build, understand and integrate new materials,” Martin said. “These advances require deep collaboration across synthesis, characterization, integration and device realms, and fostering those connections is central to RAMI’s mission. Next-generation electronics is one of the key pillars of our institute, and this workshop represents a signature Rice initiative to bring together some of the nation’s best in this space as we vision what the future looks like.”

The event included an impressive lineup of 22 plenary and invited speakers from institutions such as Cornell University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Johns Hopkins University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Northwestern University, Stanford University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Argonne National Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and others. The invited contributors presented their own perspectives on this important field while interacting with the other attendees, including graduate students and postdoctoral researchers.The latter took part in a poster session designed to highlight emerging directions and encourage new collaborations.

“Rice has an incredible momentum in advanced materials research, and this workshop really highlighted that strength,” Lee said. “By bringing national leaders to campus and fostering new partnerships, we are positioning Rice at the forefront of next-generation electronics.”

The workshop also underscored the role of collaboration across campus and with external partners. In addition to RAMI, support for the meeting was provided by Rice’s George R. Brown School of Engineering and Computing, the Smalley-Curl Institute, the Office of Research and the Office of Technology Transfer, along with contributions from leading industry partners including Oxford Instruments, STS Elionix, JEOL and Thermo Fisher Scientific.

RAMI has rapidly established itself as a major hub for materials innovation at Rice. By creating a dynamic platform for scientific exchange, RAMI is advancing cutting-edge research in semiconductor technology and driving the development of next-generation devices and materials that will shape the future of electronics.