Translucent activities include:

	Optical Silicon / Photonics
	Advanced Semiconductor Materials
	Alternate Energy Materials

Optical Silicon / Photonics

Translucent was founded in 2001 through initial investment by Silex Systems, with the aim of developing an optically active form of silicon.

This development could push low-cost silicon into the photonics arena for the first time, delivering significant cost and performance benefits. If successful, Translucent's silicon photonics materials could have broad exposure in the growing photonics market for optical communications and more importantly, for optoelectronic integration applications in the semiconductor chip market (including for optical interconnects and a silicon laser).

This project is being conducted with the Painter Optoelectronics Lab at Caltech (South California), and is scheduled to be completed in late 2009. Future specific outcomes of this program include:

• silicon optical interconnects
• a true silicon laser

Both of these structures, which must be fully compatible with today’s ‘CMOS’ chip fabrication methods, to be of value, have the potential to enable the next generation of opto-electronically integrated microprocessors.

Advanced Semiconductor Materials

The second major application of the Translucent technology is the development of advanced electronic materials for applications in the semiconductor chip industry. The relentless progress of the chip industry according to Moore’s Law is now under threat as conventional semiconductor materials struggle to perform at ever-decreasing nanoscale feature sizes. Example of specific materials solutions being developed by Translucent include the following:

Translucent Material	Target Issue
Fully depleted (ultra-thin) Silicon-on-Insulator (SOI)	Solve bulk current leakage from device layer to wafer substrate at nanoscale nodes
Ultra high-k dielectric	Solve transistor gate dielectric current leakage at nanoscale nodes

Alternative energy - advanced materials

Ultra High Efficiency Solar Cells

The third application of Translucent’s advanced materials is for high efficiency solar energy conversion cells. This material exhibits the same functionality as demonstrated with Translucent’s optical silicon material.

The objective in this project is to significantly increase solar conversion efficiencies from today’s best ~20% to ~ 40% or more via Translucent’s unique multiple-junction thin active-layer semiconductor films on cheap glass substrates. This would enable, for the first time, a paradigm shift away from expensive, inefficient silicon-wafer based solar technology to ultra-high efficiency non-wafer based multiple junction technology.

Thermoelectric Energy Conversion

Translucent’s unique materials solutions may also have significant potential in application to thermoelectric energy conversion, that is, direct solid state conversion from heat to electricity, (without steam/gas turbines).

This materials innovation is based on the following key characteristics:

• A novel set of semiconductor materials
• ‘Band-gap engineered’ multilayer junctions
• Potentially higher conversion efficiencies
• Scalable planar architectures
• Cost effective fabrication techniques

This project is still in the very early stage of development, and may take several years to establish viability.