Indiana University announced the launch of the Center for Reliable and Trusted Electronics last fall.
(WFIU/WTIU News)
As Indiana positions itself in the growing microelectronics industry and touts billions of dollars of investments, an Indiana University center is finding its niche.
The IU Center for Reliable and Trusted Electronics sits in the middle of “a perfect storm,” director Daniel Loveless said.
IU is working to close the gap between commercial uses for microelectronics and use in extreme environments such as space. IU CREATE researches how electronics fail for these specific, stringent uses.
These electronics are a fundamental need, Loveless said, so they need to be reliable.
“It's a critical part of our infrastructure,” Loveless said.
IU announced IU CREATE last fall following a $111 million investment into microelections. The funds were spread across multiple initiatives; Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division, was a partner in the investments.
People use this technology everyday in phones, cars, computers and more. Loveless said people want these electronics to be faster, smaller and more capable.
“There are new technologies being developed every couple years that we didn't conceive of just a decade ago,” Loveless said. “There's disruption after disruption.”
But the technology for extreme environments is lagging behind, and Loveless said the gap is getting wider. That’s where IU CREATE's “specific, technical mission” comes in, he said.
For example, in the vacuum of space, a lot of things can make electronics fail. There’s radiation, extreme heat and extreme cold — all things electronics are vulnerable to.
Scientists have cared about these issues since the first satellite launched into space, Loveless said.
“From that side of the coin, it's not new,” Loveless said. “What's new is the types of devices we're putting in these spacecraft. And that causes all kinds of uncertainty. And we don't like uncertainty. We try to mitigate that risk.”
Electronics today are advanced, but they’re also sensitive — so sensitive that sometimes they fail to work on Earth. They can’t withstand ground level radiation, Loveless said. That’s an issue as people trust and use these electronics for artificial intelligence, storing massive amounts of data and taking their hands off the wheels of self-driving cars.
“It's no longer constrained to the really interesting and fascinating need to put electronics in space, but it's a fundamental requirement for all future electronics,” Loveless said.
In addition to funding from the university, IU CREATE has attracted public, private and military support. IU CREATE’s partners with NASA and the Department of Defense, Loveless said. Commercial manufacturers, electronics chip creators and applications also want to work with the center.
“There are real needs,” Loveless said. “That means that there are real industries that are starting to want to be a part of what we're doing, and there are more jobs for our students to go into.”
IU has helped the center grow an interdisciplinary perspective, Loveless said.
The Department of Physics and the Department of Chemistry have collaborated on IU CREATE’s research, lending knowledge for advanced fabrication and nuclear physics. The Kelley School of Business also helped the center. MBA students checked out IU CREATE’s market potential and crafted business plans. IU CREATE hosted its first cohort of O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs fellows. It also sponsored a high school drone competition.
”It feels like a once-in-a-career opportunity,” Loveless said. “I'm just going to try to bring the energy that I have and passion that I have to the field itself and impart that on as many students and people that want to be a part of it as possible.”
Aubrey is our higher education reporter and a Report For America corps member. Contact her ataubmwrig@iu.eduor follow her on X@aubreymwright.
