Tag Archives: Leti

Testing ‘smart’ antibacterial surfaces and eating haute cuisine in space

Housekeeping in space, eh? This seems to be a French initiative. From a Nov. 15, 2016 news item on Nanowerk,

Leti [Laboratoire d’électronique des technologies de l’information (LETI)], an institute of CEA [French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission or Commissariat a l’Energie Atomique (CEA)] Tech, and three French partners are collaborating in a “house-cleaning” project aboard the International Space Station that will investigate antibacterial properties of new materials in a zero-gravity environment to see if they can improve and simplify cleaning inside spacecraft.

The Matiss experiment, as part of the Proxima Mission sponsored by France’s CNES space agency [Centre national d’études spatiales (CNES); National Centre for Space Studies (CNES)], is based on four identical plaques that European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Pesquet, the 10th French citizen to go into space, will take with him and install when he joins the space station in November for a six-month mission. The plaques will be in the European Columbus laboratory in the space station for at least three months, and Pesquet will bring them back to earth for analysis at the conclusion of his mission.

A November 15, 2016 CEA-LETI press release on Business Wire (you may also download it from here), which originated the news item, describes the proposed experiments in more detail,

Leti, in collaboration with the ENS de Lyon, CNRS, the French company Saint Gobain and CNES, selected five advanced materials that could stop bacteria from settling and growing on “smart” surfaces. A sixth material, made of glass, will be used as control material.

The experiment will test the new smart surfaces in a gravity-free, enclosed environment. These surfaces are called “smart” because of their ability to provide an appropriate response to a given stimulus. For example, they may repel bacteria, prevent them from growing on the surface, or create their own biofilms that protect them from the bacteria.

The materials are a mix of advanced technology – from self-assembly monolayers and green polymers to ceramic polymers and water-repellent hybrid silica. By responding protectively to air-borne bacteria they become easier to clean and more hygienic. The experiment will determine which one is most effective and could lead to antibacterial surfaces on elevator buttons and bars in mass-transit cars, for example.

“Leveraging its unique chemistry platform, Leti has been developing gas, liquid and supercritical-phase-collective processes of surface functionalization for more than 10 years,” said Guillaume Nonglaton, Leti’s project manager for surface chemistry for biology and health-care applications. “Three Leti-developed surfaces will be part of the space-station experiment: a fluorinated thin layer, an organic silica and a biocompatible polymer. They were chosen for their hydrophobicity, or lack of attraction properties, their level of reproducibility and their rapid integration within Pesquet’s six-month mission.”

Now, for Haute Cusine

Pesquet is bringing meals from top French chefs Alain Ducasse and Thierry Marx for delectation. The menu includes beef tongue with truffled foie gras and duck breast confit. Here’s more from a Nov. 17, 2016 article by Thibault Marchand (Agence France Presse) ong phys.org,

“We will have food prepared by a Michelin-starred chef at the station. We have food for the big feasts: for Christmas, New Year’s and birthdays. We’ll have two birthdays, mine and Peggy’s,” said the Frenchman, who is also taking a saxophone up with him.

French space rookie Thomas Pesquet, 38, will lift off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan with veteran US and Russian colleagues Peggy Whitson and Oleg Novitsky, for a six-month mission to the ISS.

Bon appétit! By the way, this is not the first time astronauts have been treated to haute cuisine (see a Dec. 2, 2006 article on the BBC [British Broadcasting Corporation] website.)

The launch

Mark Garcia’s Nov. 17, 2016 posting on one of the NASA (US National Aeronautics and Space Administration) blogs describes this latest launch into space,

The Soyuz MS-03 launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to the International Space Station at 3:20 p.m. EST Thursday, Nov. 17 (2:20 a.m. Baikonur time, Nov. 18). At the time of launch, the space station was flying about 250 miles over the south Atlantic east of Argentina. NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, Oleg Novitskiy of Roscosmos and Thomas Pesquet of ESA (European Space Agency) are now safely in orbit.

Over the next two days, the trio will orbit the Earth for approximately two days before docking to the space station’s Rassvet module, at 5:01 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 19. NASA TV coverage of the docking will begin at 4:15 p.m. Saturday.

Garcia’s post gives you details about how to access more information about the mission. The European Space Agency also offers more information as does Thomas Pesquet on his website.

ASCENT: access to European Nanoelectronics Infrastructure

ASCENT is an Irish-French-Belgian-led collaborative project designed to open up state of the state-of-the-art facilities to researchers across Europe. From a June 10, 2015 news item on Nanowerk,

ASCENT opens the doors to the world’s most advanced nanoelectronics infrastructures in Europe. Tyndall National Institute in Ireland, CEA-Leti in France and imec in Belgium, leading European nanoelectronics institutes, have entered into a collaborative open-access project called ASCENT (Access to European Nanoelectronics Network), to mobilise European research capabilities like never before.

The €4.7 million project will make the unique research infrastructure of three of Europe’s premier research centres available to the nanoelectronics modelling-and-characterisation research community.

A June 10, 2015 Imec press release, which originated the news item, expands on the theme,

The three partners will provide researchers access to advanced device data, test chips and characterisation equipment. This access programme will enable the research community to explore exciting new developments in industry and meet the challenges created in an ever-evolving and demanding digital world.

The partners’ respective facilities are truly world-class, representing over €2 billion of combined research infrastructure with unique credentials in advanced semiconductor processing, nanofabrication, heterogeneous and 3D integration, electrical characterisation and atomistic and TCAD modelling. This is the first time that access to these state-of-the-art devices and test structures will become available anywhere in the world.

The project will engage industry directly through an ‘Industry Innovation Committee’ and will feed back the results of the open research to device manufacturers, giving them crucial information to improve the next generation of electronic devices.

Speaking on behalf of project coordinator, Tyndall National Institute, CEO Dr. Kieran Drain said: “We are delighted to coordinate the ASCENT programme and to be partners with world-leading institutes CEA-Leti and imec. Tyndall has a great track record in running successful collaborative open-access programmes, delivering real economic and societal impact. ASCENT has the capacity to change the paradigm of European research through unprecedented access to cutting-edge technologies. We are confident that ASCENT will ensure that Europe remains at the forefront of global nanoelectronics development.”

“The ASCENT project is an efficient, strategic way to open the complementary infrastructure and expertise of Tyndall, Leti and imec to a broad range of researchers from Europe’s nanoelectronics modelling-and-characterisation sectors,” said Leti CEO Marie-Noëlle Semeria. “Collaborative projects like this, that bring together diverse, dedicated and talented people, have synergistic affects that benefit everyone involved, while addressing pressing technological challenges.”

“In the frame of the ASCENT project, three of Europe’s leading research institutes – Tyndall, imec and Leti – join forces in supporting the EU research and academic community, SMEs and industry by providing access to test structures and electrical data of state-of-the-art semiconductor technologies,” stated Luc Van den hove, CEO of imec. “This will enable them to explore exciting new opportunities in the ‘More Moore’ [probably a Moore’s law reference] as well as the ‘More than Moore’ domains, and will allow them to participate and compete effectively on the global stage for the development of advanced nano-electronics.”

I’m curious as to how they plan to balance industry requests with academic requests. Will organizations that can afford to pay more get preference?