Department Facilities

The department has access to the School of Engineering academic computing resources, which consist of four 600-MHz Digital Workstations, four multiprocessor 300-MHz Digital 2100 servers, five DecStation 5000/260s, and two 250-MHz Sun Ultra Enterprise 3000 server. A DEC 8200 with dual 300-MHz processors and 2GB of RAM will accept batch jobs up to 9GB. School of Engineering file service is provided by a High Availability Digital clustered NFS/CIFS file server FibreChannel connected to RAID 3/5 disk arrays. Current capacity is 324 GB, with possible expansion to more than 9TB. The file server is connected to the Gigabit Ethernet backbone and serves all Unix machines and PCs in the School of Engineering. An Auspex 7000/300 with 116GB is also available and is connected to the secondary FDDI backbone.

All of the School of Engineering resources are connected to School of Engineering network, which consists of a Gigabit Ethernet backbone with various segments connected via FDDI, 100Mb Ethernet, 10Mb Ethernet, and OC3 ATM.

Biomedical Engineering Laboratory: This lab is equipped to provide students with facilities for the study of a wide variety of problems in biomedical engineering. Equipment includes a Nikon light microscope, infrared spectrophotometer, four Grass physiographs, personal computer with data acquisition capability, a variety of analog and digital oscilloscopes, signal generators and meters.

Communications Systems Simulation Laboratory: This lab consists of 12 high-speed Silicon Graphics Workstations together with a large screen projection system. These integrated multi-media workstations run a wide array of communication system design and analysis software, signal processing software, and multi-media and web based software tools. This lab is used extensively by both undergraduate and graduate communications and signal processing courses and by graduate students conducting research in these areas.

Cryoelectronics Laboratory: The cryoelectronics laboratory is used in the investigation of electronic materials and devices at cryogenic temperatures. It provides measurement capabilities from 2K to 450K. Two low-temperature Dewars, two closed-cycle Helium refrigerators, one open cycle Helium cryostat, various cryogenic inserts, microprocessor-based programmable temperature controllers, temperature sensors, and fiber optic instrumentation support the low temperature device characterization and superconductivity research. Two computer workstations are used as system controllers for data acquisition and modeling. There is close interaction with the Solid-State Device Characterization and the Microwave Electronics Laboratories.

Digital Signal Processor Laboratory: Digital signal processors (DSP's) are programmable semiconductor devices that are used extensively in cellular phones, high-density disk drives, and high-speed modems. This laboratory course focuses on programming the Texas Instruments TMS320C50, a fixed-point processor. The emphasis is on assembly language programming and the laboratories utilize a hands-on approach that will focus on the essentials of DSP programming. Laboratory topics include implementation of FIR and IIR filters, the FFT, and a real-time spectrum analyzer. Though no formal prerequisites are required, some basic knowledge of discrete-time signals and digital logic systems is suggested.

Microwave Electronics Laboratory: The Lab utilizes HP-Series IV software donated by Hewlett-Packard. The software includes the CAE packages Touchstone, Libra, OmniSys, J-Omega, and Communications Design Suite. The software is used for education in the design and analysis of microwave circuits and systems. Also included in the facility are a 20-GHz Sampling Oscilloscope m-wave frequency Synthesizers, m-wave Power Meter, Pulse Generator, 22-GHz HP71200A Spectrum Analyzer, and a 40-GHz HP8510 Network Analyzer plus microwave amplifiers, mixers and components.

Networks Laboratory: The Networks Laboratory provides the opportunity to simulate and evaluate different network configurations from local area networks to the Internet. High-end PCs are configured with OPNET, COMNET, and other simulation software to model telecommunications networks and study their performance. The Networks Laboratory is used for instruction in conjunction with several networking courses offered in the department.

Optoelectronics Simulation Laboratory: Software programs to assist with the design of semiconductor optoelectronic devices have been evolving at SMU for decades and are currently used to design the epitaxy structures for strained-quantum well semiconductor lasers and to predict the resulting device performance. These programs deal with three broad areas: 1) quantum well gain optimization, 2) electromagnetic and optical field optimization, and 3) periodic structures and gratings. In addition to distributed feedback and distributed Bragg reflector laser design, grating software is used in the study of grating-assisted coupling between dielectric waveguides. MODEIG (available free at www.seas.smu.edu/modeig/), software for solving for the propagation characteristics of optical waveguides and used by over 50 corporations, universities, and government agencies worldwide, is maintained and regularly upgraded by this laboratory. In addition to optoelectronics research, students use software developed in this laboratory for assignments and projects in EE5312 and EE5303.

Pulsed Laser Deposition Laboratory: The facility consists of Neocera turn-key pulsed laser deposition system. The system consists of an 18 inch, turbo pumped vacuum chamber. The system has a 3 inch rf sputter gun in addition to a 6-target PLD carousel. The substrate can be heated to 950 ${^\circ}{}C$. The system uses a Lambda-Physik Compex 301 KrF excimer laser operating at 248 nm. The laser produces up to 1 Joule per pulse with a repition rate of 1 to 10 Hz. The PLD system was purchased through a grant from the National Science Foundation.

The PLD system is used primarily for the deposition of ferroelectric and pyroelectric materials used in uncooled infrared detectors. Other bolometric, superconductive, and optoelectronic materials are also investigated.

Semiconductor Laser Characterization Laboratory: This laboratory is dedicated to measuring the performance of edge-emitting and surface-emitting semiconductor lasers fabricated at SMU from materials including AlGaAs, InGaAs, InGaAsP, AlGaInAs, and AlGaInP with wavelengths ranging from 0.63 $\mu$m to 2.0 $\mu$m. Equipment and instrumentation includes optical spectrometers, visible and IR cameras and detectors for near-field and far-field measurements, power supplies for light-current measurements, temperature controlled stages for laser characterization, and custom assemblies of optical components on two floating optical tables. Commercial beam analysis software is used with several optical setups to characterize laser beams and several of the semiconductor laser evaluation stations are computer controlled. An automated probe station is used to evaluate vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs). In addition to laser research, students use this laboratory to evaluate lasers fabricated in EE 5312 and to produce video "virtual laboratory" experiences for distance students in EE5303.

Solid-State Device Characterization Laboratory: This facility is used for the characterization and modelling of solid state devices and electronic materials. The laboratory has the capability for the computerized I-V, C-V, microwave, optical, and noise characterization of devices. This lab is designed for computer controlled data acquisition and modelling.
The electrical and noise characterization facilities include an HP-UX workstation running IC-CAP with a HP4142 source monitor unit and HP4284 LCR meter for I-V and C-V characterization and two magnets. The lab also contains a 6 ft. x 6 ft. shielded room with a noise attenuation of 100 dB to electric fields and plane waves from 14 kHz to 10 GHz and 30 dB to magnetic fields at 60 Hz. The lab includes two dynamic low frequency dynamic signal analyzers, lock-in amplifiers, various programmable multimeters, oscilloscopes, and LCR meters plus plotters and printers, and system controllers.

The microwave measurement equipment includes a 200 KHz to 22 GHz HP71200A spectrum analyzer, an HP8510 (40 MHz to 40 GHz) network analyzer, an HP54120T 20 GHz sampling oscilloscope, microwave power meters, and various microwave components and amplifiers.
The optical characterization facilities include an Oriel MS257 spectometer/monochrometer, two IR sources, a calibrated pyroelectric detector, various fiberoptic components, laser diodes and Ortel 7 GHz photodiodes. The monochrometer/spectrometer and IR sources allow the characterization of devices and materials from 1 - 12 mmicrons.

Solid-State Technology Laboratory: Major equipment in this laboratory includes two projection printers and two contact printers for lithography, a plasma reactor for etch and deposition of dielectrics, an rf/dc sputter deposition system, two plasma etch systems, two reactive ion etch systems, a chemically-assisted ion-beam etch system, an e-beam evaporator for metalization, an e-beam evaporator for dielectric deposition, a thermal evaporator for metal deposition, a pulsed laser deposition system, a scanning electron microscope, and oxidation, diffusion, and annealing furnaces. This laboratory, which includes   1700 ft$^2$ of clean room, is used for instruction in the fabrication of silicon integrated circuits and laser diodes in EE 5312 and supports research in laser diodes, uncooled infrared detectors, microelectromechanical (MEM) devices, and NbN and YBaCuO superconductor devices.

Submicron Grating Laboratory: This laboratory is dedicated to the holographic fabrication of submicron gratings. Equipment in this lab includes a floating optical table, a visible argon ion laser, an ultraviolet argon ion laser, laser power meter, and optical components for holography. Typical grating linewidths range from 0.09 $\mu$m to 0.5 $\mu$m and can be specified to an accuracy of +0.0001 $\mu$m. In addition to supporting research on semiconductor lasers and telecommunications components, this laboratory is used by students in EE 5312 to fabricate gratings.