INTERNATIONAL SEMICONDUCTOR CONFERENCE

- CAS-

The International Semiconductor Conference is organized by the National Institute for Research and Development in Microtechnologies (IMT-Bucharest) - Romania, under the aegis of the Electrochemical Society Inc., Romanian Academy, Romanian National Agency for Science, Technology and Innovation, IEEE Romania Section and ED Romania Chapter, beeing co-sponsored by the IEEE Electron Devices Society.
The International Semiconductor Conference began in Romania in 1978 as the Annual Semiconductor Conference (CAS), and became an annual national scientific event. Political changes in Eastern and Central Europe in 1989 led to the opening of the conference to the free world of science and technology. Every year since 1991, CAS has been bringing together about 200 participants from Europe, Asia, Africa and the USA who together present 110-150 papers annually, published (in English) in the CAS Proceedings. Beginning with 1995, CAS entered in the scientific schedule of the Electron Devices Society, thus enjoying an important support and publicity.
CAS intends to provide a forum for presentation and discussion of the main achievements in physics, design, technology and application of solid-state devices and materials. The conference aims at bringing together scientists and engineers actively engaged in the front of solid-state devices and technologies, focusing on a very modern field as microsystems.
Papers are solicited in the following areas: semiconductor device physics and technology (device modeling and simulation, silicon and compound semiconductor devices, heterostructures, advanced materials and processes, reliability and defect engineering); IC's design and system integration (low voltage-low power IC's, device interconnect technology, monolithic, multi-chip and hybrid ASICs, testing and reliability); microstructures and microsystems (surface and bulk micromachining, microengineering techniques, electro-opto-mechanical microsystems, microsensor and actuator integration, signal processing and system interfacing), with particular emphasis on: power devices and IC's, nanotechnologies and quantum devices, novel microwave devices and circuits, new materials for microsystems, chemical sensors and biosensors.
The total number of the papers in the past nine CAS editions increased from 83 in 1991 to 159 in 1994 and stabilized on 120-130 since 1995; the weight of the foreign papers followed a growing trend from 1991 to 1996, remaining at about 50% in the last two years.

The Conference Program consists of in invited papers presented in plenary sessions as well as in front of certain sessions, and in contributed papers (structured in oral or poster sessions); the Program includes a Student Papers Session. The best student paper is awarded by the ED Romania Chapter. Contributed papers are selected on the basis of a submitted extended abstract. Both invited and contributed papers are published in the CAS Proceedings, which are available for all participants on the first day of the conference, beeing laterly distributed worldwide through the IEEE Book Broker Program.
The international CAS editions have contributed to the growth of the West-East scientific information flow and, at the same time, have emphasized the important scientific and creative potential of Central and Eastern Europe, becoming a representative conference in the field of semiconductors and microsystems in Europe. Famous scientific authorities recognized the importance of the conference and many accepted to become members of the CAS International Advisory Committee: Dr. C.D. Bulucea (National Semiconductor, Santa Clara, CA, USA), Dr. S. Cristoloveanu (CNRS-LPCS, Grenoble, France), Prof. D. Dascalu (IMT-Bucharest, Romania), Prof. R.B. Fair (Duke Univ., NC, USA), Prof. U.M. Gösele (Max-Planck Inst., Halle, Germany), Prof. R. Grigorovici (Romanian Academy, Romania), Prof. H.G. Grimmeiss (Lund Univ., Sweden), Prof. A. Jelenski (ITME, Warsaw, Poland), Prof. M.K. Lee (Yonsei Univ., Seoul, Korea), Prof. H. Lüth (ISI, Jülich, Germany), Prof. J. Millán (CNM, Barcelona, Spain), Dr. A. Mircea (CNET, Bagneux, France), Prof. I. Munteanu (Univ. of Bucharest, Romania), Dr. Y. Okuto (NEC Corp., Japan), Prof. R. van Overstraeten (IMEC, Leuven, Belgium), Prof. S.T. Pantelides (Vanderbilt Univ., TN, USA), Prof. M. Profirescu “Politehnica” Univ., Romania), Prof. S. Selberherr (Technical Univ., Vienna, Austria), Prof. N. Stojadinovic (Univ. of Nis, Yugoslavia), Prof. K. Sumino (Nippon Steel Corp., Japan), Prof. S.M. Sze (National Chiao Tung Univ.,Taiwan), Prof. F.J. Tegude (Duisburg Univ., Germany), Prof. A. Tugulea (“Politehnica” Univ., Romania).
The International Semiconductor Conference has gained the status of a regional event and has the potential to become a major forum for scientific exchange between the West and the former Eastern Europe Community. “It is impressive to experience the breadth and quality of original work presented there, particulary from countries which could not afford to send their research personnel to Western Europe, the USA or Japan, but which practice a very lively and highly original research effort where many new concepts and ideas are generated. This international conference is therefore strongly recommended as a most stimulating event” – as quoted by Prof. H.L. Hartnagel (Institut für Hochfrequenztechnik, Technische Hochschule Darmstadt, Germany).

World’s leading foreign experts and scientists from Western Europe, USA and Japan attended CAS, presenting about 70 invited papers as well as more then 400 contributed papers. Among them there were: Prof. J.M. Chante, Prof. A. Chovet and Prof. G. Kamarinos (France), Prof. J.H. Fluitman and Prof. J. Holleman (The Netherlands), Prof. U.M. Goesele, Prof. H.L. Hartnagel, Prof. D. Jäger and Prof. H. Lange (Germany), Prof. G.A.J. Amaratunga, Prof. W. Milne and Dr. M. Penn (United Kingdom), Prof. G.J. Adriaenssens and Prof. D. Flandre (Belgium), Prof. K. Hjort (Sweden), Dr. A.A. Jaecklin (Switzerland), Prof. E. Langer and Prof. H. Kosina (Austria), Prof. J. Millán (Spain), Prof. G. Papaioannou, Dr. A.G. Nassiopolou and Prof. J. Stoemenos (Greece), Prof. H. Unlü (Turkey), Prof. R.T. Chen, Prof. A. Iliadis, Prof. J.J. Liou and Prof. S.T. Pantelides (USA), Prof. K. Sumino and Prof. H. Tsuya (Japan).

The International Semiconductor Conference allowed the Romanian scientific community to grow stronger contacts with Romanian scientists working in well-known universities, research laboratories and companies all around the world: Dr. C.D. Bulucea (National Semiconductor Corp., Santa Clara, CA, USA), Dr. S. Cristoloveanu (CNRS-LPCS, Grenoble, France), Dr. A. Mircea (CNET-Laboratoire de Bagneux, France, Dr. L. Vescan (Inst. for Thin Films and Ion Technology, Jülich, Germany), Prof. A. Vladimirescu (Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA, USA), Dr. A. Wild (Motorola, Semiconductor Products Sector, Phoenix, AZ, USA), and many others from CNRS-LAAS, Toulouse, France, Cambridge Univ. and De Montfort Univ. from United Kingdom, Max Planck Inst. of Microstructures Physics, Halle (Saale), Germany, Delft Univ. of Technology and Eindhoven Univ. of Tehnology from The Netherlands, Swiss Federal Inst. of Technology, Lausanne, Switzerland, Nagoya Inst. of Technology and Electrotechnical Lab., Tsukuba from Japan, Physico-Technical Inst. “A.F. Ioffe”, St. Petersburg, Russia.

Several special events were organized jointly with CAS during this period.

Invited speakers:
Prof. O. Bonnaud, Comitet National de Formation en Microelectronique Centre Comun de Microelectronique de l’Ouest, Rennes, France;
Prof. M.C. Bodea, “Politehnica” University Bucharest, Faculty of Electronics and Telecommunication, Romania.

Invited speakers:
Dr. J. Suski, Schlumberger Industries, Montrouge, France;
Dr. H.-C. Petzold, Nexus - Office ISiT, Berlin, Germany;
Prof. R. Puers, MICAS, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium;
Dr. S. Fontanell, LETI, Grenoble, France;
Dr. S. Lerch, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne, Switherland.

Moderators:
Prof. D. Dascalu, General Manager of IMT-Bucharest, Romania;
Dr. D. Sachelarie, State Counsellor to the Prime Minister Romania.

Invited speakers:
Prof. W. Goepel, University of Tubingen, Germany
Dr. N. Barsan, University of Tubingen, Germany

Within the 22^nd edition of the International Semiconductor Conference (CAS’99) Romania was represented by 58 regular papers, as compared to 47 regular and 10 invited papers coming from 20 countries on 3 continents (14 countries from Europe, 1 from America and 4 from Asia).

The quality of papers accepted to be published in the Proceedings was guaranteed by the evaluation made by 76 referees (including members of the International Advisory Committee and of the Technical Program Committee).

A special NEXUS Session on “Microsystems”, with invited and regular papers (both oral and poster presentation) was organized with the support of the NEXUSPAN Project, financed by the European Commission.

Within the NEXUS Session five invited papers were presented by Prof. A. Jelenki (Inst. of Electronic Materials Technology, Warsaw, Poland), Dr. P. Salomon (VDI/VDE-IT, Teltow, Germany), Dr. R.J. Wiegerink and Prof. J. Holleman (MESA Research Inst., Univ. of Twente, The Netherlands), and Prof. R.T. Chen (Microelectronics Research Center Univ. of Texas, USA).