Clean room as classroom | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology - MIT News

During the fall 2021 semester, these students were part of 6.S059 (Nanotechnology — Design From Atoms to Everything) and 6.A06 (First.nano! - Fabricate Your Own Solar Cell in MIT.nano Cleanroom), two classes offered by the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) aimed at introducing undergraduates to nanoscience through design-focused learning utilizing relevant fabrication processes and tool sets.

Class 6.S059 was developed to bridge the fundamentals of engineering design with the actual building of functional integrated technologies, something typically separated into multiple classes and semesters.

“We wanted to teach the science of what you need to design nanodevices and systems in an interactive and hands-on way,” says co-instructor Farnaz Niroui, the EE Landsman (1958) Career Development Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT.

We decided to teach it through an applied approach — having the students design and build, while learning the fundamentals along the way.”.

For their final project, the students divided into teams to design and build their own functioning devices.

“Seeing the students design and build their own devices after only a few weeks of instruction was exciting and impressive,” says Ram.

“First.nano!," an advising seminar for first-year students, had similar goals: showing undergraduates what’s possible at the nanoscale through hands-on clean-room experiences.

For three hours each week, MIT students in 6.A06 explored MIT.nano’s facilities, experimenting with nanotechnology tool sets and building silicon solar cells under the guidance of co-instructors Jesús del Alamo, the Donner Professor of Engineering, and Jorg Scholvin, the MIT.nano assistant director for user services.

“How do we get first-year students interested in nanofabrication?” asks Jorg Scholvin.

And, with experience working in a particle-free environment, Scholvin says, these students are now prepared for future opportunities, such as conducting nanoscale research with faculty through the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program

By creating opportunities for these students to work and study here, we hope to open it up to broad use for undergraduate research and education.”

Undergraduates from both 6.S059 and 6.A06 are invited to present their work at the Microsystems Annual Research Conference (MARC), co-sponsored by MIT.nano and the Microsystems Technology Laboratories in January