All About Irvine Hacker Fab
What We Do
Irvine Hacker Fab is UC Irvine’s only semiconductor project team with 100+ active members. We are an interdisciplinary, student-led group dedicated to making microfabrication tools accessible, affordable, and open source.
While cutting-edge chips require billion-dollar facilities, education-scale processes do not. We target that gap: classroom-scale, low-cost tools that make hands-on fabrication practical for students, researchers, and community labs.
We successfully achieved 3 semiconductor fabrication processes last year!
Our Impact
Community scale: 100+ students attend general meetings; 500+ students participate in our Discord community.
Education: We run workshops that teach the end-to-end process flow: clean, coat, expose or align, develop, bake or anneal, deposit, and measure.
Technical depth: Members gain experience by building the tools they use and by integrating optics, motion, control, sensors, vacuum, and thermal systems.
Cleanroom experience: Students receive supervised training and process exposure at the UCI Nanofabrication Facility, connecting benchtop learning to industry tools.
Open-ended research: Students work in interdisciplinary teams on real problems and document results for others to reproduce.
Interdisciplinary Collaboration: Physics, mathematics, computer science and engineering, computer science, electrical engineering, computer engineering, materials science, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, and biomedical engineering.
Attendees viewing news presentation segment at Irvine Hacker Fab meeting
Our Goals
Last year, we were able to research, build, and develop 3 semiconductor fabrication tools: a tube furnace, a spin coater, and a lithostepper. With these tools, we achieved oxide growth, thin film deposition, and photoresist patterning of 5µm features.
This year, we will transition from proof-of-concept tools to developing a cohesive, automated micro-fab line by:
- engineering an automatic XYZ stage for maskless lithography and alignment
- developing V2 upgrades for our current tools (lithostepper, tube furnace controls, spincoater)
- developing magnetron sputtering and thermal evaporation tools for thin-film deposition
- executing a system level integration that demonstrates wafer-level processing and quantitative performance
Our students conducting pattern development in the lab
With the addition of a Sputtering rig, Version 2 enhancements, and automated control systems, we aim to broaden our manufacturing capabilities to build Thin Film Transistors, High Frequency RF Antenna Patches, CMOS Gates, and more! This opens the floor for undergraduate research opportunities, custom semiconductor fabrication, and broadened educational opportunities.
Lithography test patterns demonstrating 5-micron features
Your Support
By contributing to The Irvine Hacker Fab, you take a part in revolutionizing the Micro Fabrication industry and aid in cultivating a comprehensive and innovative on-campus community. You help bring together engineering, scientists, and entrepreneurs across disciplines to work together on not just a project, but an initiative for driving innovation.
Democratizing the semiconductor industry is not a small task. Support and sponsorships allow our student researchers to build, test, and develop microfabrication tools. Each dollar brings Hacker Fab closer and closer to creating accessible solutions for students and researchers alike.
Your Support will directly help the Irvine Hacker Fab demystify the semiconductor industry and bring its technology accessible to millions. Be part of an initiative that will revolutionize semiconductor manufacturing!
Contact Us
If you would like to contribute to The Irvine Hacker Fab in other ways, or connect with us directly, please email us at irvinehackerfab@gmail.com.
$25
Silicon
Help fund lab consumables and we will add you to the supporter's wall on website!
$50
Wafer
Help fund consumables and materials used in a project and get your name added to the supporter's wall on website plus at the end of our demo credits!
$100
Lithographer
Help fund tools and materials for a part of a project and get your name/logo and short message at the end of our demo credits.
$250
Transistor
Help fund a small project or a subsystem, such as a spin coater or tube furnace control system and get your name/logo on one of our fabrication tools. We will also add your name/logo to our posters, research papers, and give you a shoutout when we attend conferences.
$500
Logic Gate
Help fund a portion of our major projects, such as Lithography Stepper or Thermal Evaporation and you will get your name/logo on all of our fabrication tools. Plus, you will be invited to our recruiting event and receive access to our resume book.
$1,000
IC Chip
Help fund one of the more expensive projects central to our semiconductor development, such as RF sputtering or a thermal evaporation chamber. And to show our thanks, you will be invited to attend a lab tour and custom on-campus or virtual recruiting event, given priority access to our resume book, and we will display a large name/logo on our socials, website, and other documentation.
$2,000
Foundry
Fund an entire semiconductor tool development cycle and bring us one step closer to fabricating a transistor. And to show our thanks, you will receive all the perks listed at the IC Chip ($1,000) level plus a custom patterned silicon chip with company name and message.
