Michael Postek
Asst. to the NIST Director for Nanotechnology
NIST


Talk Title: "Nanotechnology at NIST"

Abstract
Advances in fundamental nanoscience, design of new nano-materials, and ultimately manufacturing of new nanoscale products will all depend to some degree on the capability to accurately and reproducibly measure properties and performance characteristics at the nanoscale. “Nanotechnology is the understanding and control of matter at dimensions of roughly 1 to 100 nanometers where unique phenomena enable new and novel applications” . Where these new and unique properties manifest themselves is not fully known and new measurement techniques are needed to measure these new phenomena. Nanotechnology involves imaging, measuring, modeling, and manipulating matter at this length scale. It is imperative that a strong measurement and standards infrastructure be developed to support this work and the developing nanotechnology industry. Decades of nanoscience research have led to remarkable progress in nanotechnology as well as an evolution of instrumentation and metrology suitable for some of the nanoscale measurements. Consequently, today’s suite of metrology tools has been designed to meet the needs of exploratory nanoscale research, and new techniques, tool, instruments and infrastructure will be needed to support a successful nanotechnology industry manufacturing commercial products. Currently available metrology tools are also beginning to reach the limits of resolution, accuracy and capability, and are not expected to meet future requirements for nanomanufacturing. A revolutionary approach to metrology may be required in the near future. In this presentation I will discuss some NIST work in nanotechnology and nanometrology and present some results of from the NNI Interagency Workshop on Instrumentation and Metrology for Nanotechnology held in Gaithersburg, MD. I will also discuss the new Nanomanufacturing User Facility to help bridge the gap for new and potentially revolutionary nanometrology to be developed to meet the needs of nanotechnology research and nanomanufacturing.

Biographical Sketch
Dr. Michael T. Postek the Assistant to the Director for Nanotechnology and Acting Chair of the NIST Nanotechnology Strategic Working Group. He is also the Leader of the Nano-scale Metrology Group and Program Manager of the Nanomanufacturing Program in the Manufacturing Engineering Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Dr. Postek is both a nationally and internationally recognized expert in scanning electron microscope (SEM) critical dimension (CD) metrology.

Dr. Postek’s current research areas include nanotechnology and nanometrology. He has been involved with electron microscopy for over 30 years and micro and nano-scale scanning electron microscope-based length metrology for over 20 years and has published over 180 papers, articles and book chapters on this and related topics. He is a charter member of the International SEMATECH Advanced Metrology Advisory Group and a contributor to the International Technology Roadmap. His work centers on improvements in SEM relative to nanotechnology and semiconductor related metrology. Among his credits are: 2005 Nano 50 Award, NIST bronze medal, two NIST silver medals, 1998 R&D 100 Award, Federal Laboratory Consortium Award for Technology Transfer and NIST top 100 papers Award 2000.

Dr Postek received his B. A. from the University of South Florida (1973); M. S. from Texas A&M University (1974); Ph.D. from Louisiana State University (1980) and an Executive M. S. in Technology Management from the University of Maryland (1997).

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