Yorkshire gets £4 million Electron Lithography Facility

One of the most high-resolution electron-beam lithography systems in Europe will soon be helping scientists in Yorkshire break new ground in nanotechnology. The system is to be installed at the University of Leeds, thanks to a £2.7 million grant from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), in

partnership with the Universities of Sheffield and York. Its purchase is supported by additional strategic investment from the University of Leeds and industrial funding for PhD studentships, bringing the total investment in the facility to close to £4 million. This project was specifically designed to train a large group of PhD students

to improve the skill base in Yorkshire.

“This instrument will take us to the next level of sophistication in terms of nanoengineering,” said Professor Edmund Linfield, from the School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Leeds. “The system’s sub-10 nm resolution will really help us bridge the gap to molecular scale patterning. In short, it will allow us to undertake the fundamental scientific work that will underpin the next generation of materials that will emerge over the coming decades, and allow us to design devices that will find industrial applications from the electronic to the medical sectors.”

The instrument – which will be unique in the region–is to be supplied by electron microscope manufacturer JEOL, which will also be funding up to ten new PhD studentships specifically linked to the electron-beam lithography over the next five years at the Universities of Leeds, Sheffield and York. It is expected that up to half of these will involve collaborative research with an industrial partner. University of York.