Precise control of magnetization reversal in patterned magnetic nanostructures is a key parameter for future application in random access memories, hard disk media and, more recently, in magnetic logic devices. In the latter case, it has been demonstrated that magnetic elements could perform logic operations analogously to current microelectronic devices and a very promising scheme based on magnetic domain wall (DW) propagation in magnetic nanostructures has been proposed. However, the relationship between DW dynamics and the structural and magnetic properties is not well understood. The aim of this project is both to understand and optimize the dynamics of domain wall propagation in magnetic nanostructures. Thus, new epitaxial magnetic multilayers, based on binary alloys (FePt, FePd?) will be used to understand better the relationship between the microstructure and the magnetic properties. The influence of the microstructure (grains, chemical order?), defects (intrinsic or induced by patterning), geometry of the nanostructure, magnetic features (anisotropy, DW width, DW type, exchange biased DW?) on DW dynamics will be studied by time resolved magnetotransport measurements. Single artificial defects will further be incorporated by nanolithography techniques in order to study the DW-single defect interaction. The final objective is to optimize the DW velocity and to drive it precisely in a nanocircuit between given positions, which is of great interest for the development of novel devices based on DW propagation capable of storing information or performing logical operations. The applicant and apos;s contrasted experience on the fabrication of magnetic epitaxial nanostructures and on the magnetic domain wall propagation and his collaborations with national and international laboratories, as well as the quality and experience on magnetism of the laboratory members that has accepted the applicant are highly suitable to successfully develop this project.

This research proposal aims to study the correlation between the defects generated by the radiation and the degradation observed in the macroscopic characteristics of microelectronic devices, following this strategy, we will be able to develop and obtain new materials and devices more resistant to radiation. The research activities are divided in two branches. The first objective is to investigate the radiation hardening of silicon detectors, to be used especially in High Energy Physics experiments. Our interest will mainly focus on the evaluation of the radiation hardness of standard and oxygen-enriched High Resistivity silicon. The analysis will be performed on both, test structures and full-size radiation detectors. The main specific potential advantages and drawbacks in detectors processing with oxygen-rich material will be investigated. Based on the analysis of the experimental outcome, as well as on technological and electrical simulation results, it is expected to improve the process technology, as well as the silicon radiation detectors design. Our second objective is to study the radiation effects on the performance and reliability of thin gate dielectrics and CMOS transistors, which are essential for the correct circuits operation in high radiation environments. Our interest will focus on the mechanisms that lead to the radiation-induced degradation of the gate dielectric layers subjected to high energy irradiations. Especial emphasis will be given to the electrical stability and post irradiation response of the generated damage. The thermal and electrical annealing kinetics of the radiation-induced damage will be determined. It is expected to elaborate degradation models enabling prediction of device performance and reliability in radiation-harsh environments, as well as Guidelines for hardening the technologies.

Flexible circuit boards are a functionally pivotal and rapidly growing technology for electronics goods. Applicationsinclude: computer peripherals (e.g. flat panel displays, ink-jet printers, disc drives), hand held devices (e.g. GPS, personaldigital assistants, membrane keyboards), telecommunications (mobile phones), automotive (e.g. engine controls,dashboards/connections), smart cards (antenna foils), aerospace (lightweight, compact systems) and medical devices (e.g.sensors). The drive to use flexible circuits is based on the technologies ability to: reduce size, weight, assembly time andcost, accommodate relative movement between component parts, increase system reliability (reduced interconnect), improvecontrolled impedance signal transmission and heat dissipation and enable three dimensional packaging.These benefits have resulted in a significant increase in the use of flexible circuits for electronics and systems assembly,particularly consumer products. The global market size has been estimated by various bodies to be between 4 billion to 7billion with anticipated growth rates up to 15% per year.Flexible circuits are most commonly manufactured using one of two base materials, either polyimide or polyester. Theformer is favoured where soldering is required, the latter is generally used in low cost applications. Both flexible circuitmaterial systems are sensitive to temperature (continuous service temperature: polyimide ~177C, polyester ~74C), whichraises considerable concerns as to their capabilities of withstanding the higher soldering temperatures, which will beimposed by lead-free solder and its impact on their operating properties. As flexible circuits are developing into such asignificant technology for electronic products, with a major role in manufacturing and assembly being played by SMEs, it isessential that an understanding of the impact of this major change in technology on flexible circuits is #

Recent years have seen spectacular advances in the performance and functionality of quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) based on intersubband transitions in III-V semiconductor quantum wells. There remain, however, a large number of relatively unexplored areas in QCL research which offer the potential to raise performance to still higher levels, as well as shedding light on new areas of semiconductor device physics. For example, rapid non-radiative intersubband scattering by LO-phonon emission places fundamental limits on optical gain in current QCL designs, which could potentially be overcome by reducing dimensionality by application of high magnetic fields or by novel structures exploiting semiconductor quantum dots. Similarly, there is considerable need for a full understanding of the processes that lead to optical gain in THz QCLs, where the intersubband separation is below the LO phonon energy. The potential for short wavelength operation would be greatly enhanced by improved knowledge of the electronic parameters of Sb-based heterostructure systems which could lead to the development of intersubband sources and modulators at telecoms wavelengths. Another exciting prospect arises from exploiting the non-linear optical properties of QCL structures to produce a wide range of operating wavelengths by second harmonic and sum/difference frequency generation. Related studies of structures incorporating photonic crystal waveguides and/or exploiting surface plasmon effects also promise to lead to key advances in QCL functionality. The proposed research training network brings together 9 European leaders in the fields of quantum cascade lasers and non-linear optics to form a coherent body of expertise which is strongly placed to investigate these fundamental areas which promise to underpin the next generation of QCLs and other intersubband devices. The proposed research programme will provide the focus for over 400 months of Early Stage and Experienced Researcher training.

The main objective of this project is the development of novel transparent conductive oxides (TCOs) with enhanced electrical properties and tuned transparency from UV to mid-IR. The innovative aspect of the project methodology is the strong correlation and interaction between theoretical first principle modelling and experimental studies. Three demonstrators have been selected to show the potential applications of the TCOs, which will be developed in this project, thus opening the way and giving the possibilities for Europe to lead in the new and emerging TCO-based technologies.TCOs show the unique combination of properties: co-existence of optical transparency in the visible region and controllability of electronic conduction from insulator to metal. Transparent conductive oxides continue to be in high demand because of the immediate applications they can find in a variety of new technologies, ranging from thin film coatings and sensor devices, to light detecting and emitting devices in telecommunications. However, the current industry standard, tin doped In2O3 (Indium Tin Oxide or ITO) suffers from the high raw material cost of indium. In addition, the non-optimal conductivity and transparency, and the chemical instability of ITO in some device structures, have limited its potential applications. Moreover, almost all TCOs used nowadays are n-type. The p-type TCOs reported to date have conductivities at least an order of magnitude lower than their n-type counterparts. If p-type materials with high conductivities and controlled transparencies could be manufactured industrially, a variety of new applications would open up, including transparent electronics and opto-electronics, organic light emitting diodes, integrated electro-optical (waveguide) sensors and functional windows. The aforementioned limitations of n-type TCOs and the lack of p-type TCOs with optimum transparent and conductive properties have been the motivation and the driving force for this project.

The goal of VIMPA is to develop a new class of high energy and high power density generators to be embedded in portable or autonomous devices. The addressed domain is the one of Power MEMS, i.e. Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems able to exploit combustion for mechanical and electrical power generation. Output densities are projected to reach many W/cc for power, while energy densities up to many KJ/cc are expected: both values are several times higher than the respective upper values of traditional batteries. Few attempts have been and are being conducted worldwide (mainly in the USA and in Japan) in the field, but no usable products have been developed, despite the strong need for miniature high performance power supplies and in spite of dedicated research programs and funding. The main reason of this delay is the adopted approach which consists of scaling down traditional engines, by developing micro turbomachinery or microengines inspired by already existing concepts. VIMPA aims at introducing a discontinuity in the Power MEMS technology by developing vibrating frictionless structures associated with repeated combustions. The first core idea is to focus on positive displacement machines instead of turbomachinery, where dissipation due to drag forces causes large inefficiencies in the micro domain. The second paradigm is to avoid any rotary or sliding joint in the engine mechanism, thus reducing friction, and to use elastic storing of energy instead of inertial, flywheels-like means, which become ineffective when scaling down machine's size. The enabling paradigm for the success of VIMPA is a real multidisciplinary consortium in which state of the art teams in combustion research, microengineering design and MEMS fabrication are included. VIMPA's goal will allow EU research to excel in an interdisciplinary field, the one of Power MEMS, which has connections, but does not directly fall, within FP6 thematic priorities.

In this project we aim to invent and develop new techniques for the retrieval of figurative images (such as clip art, logos, signs) from large databases. Our techniques will be based on the extraction and matching of perceptually relevant shape features, thereby overcoming many of the limitations of existing methods. This project will develop and evaluate new algorithms for:� Perceptual segmentation of raw images, and grouping of shape elements.� Matching of geometrical patterns representing shape features.� Partial matching: fitting part of one shape with part of another.� Indexing shape features in huge databases of figurative images.� Indexing the relative spatial layout of shape features within these images.The project meets the objectives of the FET programme through a highly innovative (and hence high-risk) programme to develop novel techniques for shape matching aimed at tackling one of the key problems limiting the effectiveness of current image retrieval techniques. Our project offers the possibility of significant advances at both the scientific and economic level. New in our approach is the primary role of perceptually relevant shape features, the emphasis on the unsolved problem of partial matching, and indexing over lay-out and shapes rather than over feature vectors. The newly developed algorithms will be experimentally verified in a prototype system, and subjected to rigorous evaluation on databases with independently-validated ground truth.We consider that the Profi project meets the objectives of FET Open. Specifically: � The proposed research is inherently innovative, high-risk and long-term.� It is embryonic research, showing proof-of concept.� It holds out the promise of major advances at a foundational level.

The ever growing competition on the international markets pushes manufacturers towards shorter design cycles and decreasing manufacturing times and costs for their products. This trend generates a demand for smart, flexible and faster machining systems, easy to set up and configure, which are able to drastically reduce machining time, while improving the final accuracy. Machine axis acceleration of speed 3-5 times higher than conventional ones together with machining accuracy in the range of 0.5-1 µm will be the most probable targets of the new generation of machining systems inside manufacturing shops. Inertial forces, dynamic vibration and stability problems arising from such an accelerations will be so big that, if no suitable solutions are provided, the precision and machining quality will be definitely endangered. Strong mass reduction of mobile machine parts together with the increasing of their stiffness and damping to get excellent static, dynamic and thermal stability of the structures is becoming a 'must', to ensure a technological and cost-effective achievement of such an ambitious goals. Conventional materials for building machine tools are commonly cast iron, welded steel and in some case aluminium-alloy. Recently, especially in some running EU projects studies have been carried out to introduce polymeric matrix composites (PMC-fibers reinforced) materials, aluminium Honeycomb and glued structures. Even if good results in term of mass reduction and damping increasing seem to be achieved within such a projects, this will be absolutely not enough to get the declared excellent technological machine performances. The research will be focused on new materials for macroscale applications to reach a full and deep integration between structural and mechatronic parts of the machines in order to get an 'unicum' solution able to perform itself all the required functions.Therefore the primary goals is to achieve cost-effective'

In the recent years, quantum continuous variables (QCV) have emerged as a tool of major importance for developing novel quantum communication and information processing protocols. Encoding quantum continuous information into the quadrature of a quantized light mode or into the collective spin variable of a mesoscopic atomic ensemble has proven to be a very interesting alternative to the standard concept of quantum bit-based processes. Several experimental breakthroughs have been achieved recently demonstrating this concept, namely the quantum teleportation of a coherent state, the generation of entangled light beams with soliton pulses in nonlinear fibers, the preparation of distant entangled atomic ensembles, or the implementation of a quantum key distribution scheme relying on coherent states. In view of these spectacular results, many developments of QCV information systems can be foreseen.The present proposal aims at initiating an exploratory research on new quantum informational concepts involving continuous variables, both on the theoretical and experimental sides. It departs from the 'traditional' approaches of quantum computing in that we do not address the 'scalability' of some potential technology for quantum information processing which is not yet applicable. Instead, we start from a concept that has already been proven very successful in the laboratory. The topics which we plan to cover include improved or novel quantum communication protocols, quantum memories and quantum repeaters based on the light-atoms quantum interface, and the generation of squeezed or entangled solitonic light beams based on various nonlinearities in fibers. The role of non-Gaussian states of light will also be investigated in order to make new QCV informational processes possible. Another focus of this project will be the study of the fundamental physics governing the off-resonant interaction of light with an atomic ensemble.

The integration of computers into every day life requires smaller, more powerful but less power consuming processing units. According to the ITRS roadmap, devices based on Si-only technology will face serious obstacles hindering downscaling and power reduction within a few years. Parallel data processing, faster interactions between logic functions and memories, and reconfigurable logic functions are needed in particular for applications that require image processing. In magnetic logic the direction of the magnetisation in sub-micron patterned ferromagnets is identified with Boolean logic 1 or 0. The input changes the magnetisation of one structure and the output - i.e. the logic function - is then defined by the layout and the magnetisation states of the subsequent structures. As first demonstrated by the partners UDUR and UOB, Magnetic Logic promises low power non-volatile computing, 'on the fly' re-programmability, massively parallel character and ultrafast operation and thus has the potential to become a key technology for logic circuits. Magnetic Logic could also bring together real time reconfiguration and universal memory - key success factors compared to other semiconductor techniques for reconfigurable logic. This FET-OPEN STREPS project will integrate key European research groups hi the field hitherto unrelated to each other. Three approaches to Magnetic Logic will be compared to establish the proof of concept of this new technology, keeping Europe at the forefront of magnetic logic. The consortium comprises the two leading European laboratories UOB and UDUR, reinforced by groups bringing alternative approaches (CEA - Hall effect), experimental and theoretical techniques (TUKL and UPS) and an industrial partner (ST) with the capacity for developing the required architecture and advanced CMOS technology. The largest of the four work packages jointly explores and drives forward the frontiers of magnetic logic by establishing full Boolean families and interco