4D LABS

Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia
What the facility does

Open-access facility for advanced materials research and development including advanced prototyping and testing services.

Areas of expertise

4D LABS collaborates with academic and industrial researchers to advance new technologies from the benchtop to the marketplace in a range of fields, including clean energy, quantum technology, health and medicine and telecommunications. In addition to a range of materials-focused academic laboratories, 4D LABS hosts user facilities accessible to researchers from academia, industry and government. These user facilities include a nanofabrication facility with an advanced clean room, as well as a characterization facility equipped with a suite of electron microscopes and other analytical tools. Together, these user facilities enable the design, fabrication and complete characterization of new materials and devices—all under one roof.

There are several ways to work with 4D LABS. Researchers may choose to receive full training and carry out every aspect of their device design, fabrication and testing independently. They can contract 4D LABS to perform some or all of the work on their behalf. Alternatively, they may collaborate directly with a 4D LABS faculty member. To date, 4D LABS has partnered with organizations across a broad spectrum of industrial sectors. Its teams have contributed to the development of high-efficiency solar cells, leading-edge lighting technologies, nanomaterials for security features, biofluidics devices and many other innovations.

Research services
  • Additive technologies
  • Proof of concept/proof of commercial concept
  • Product enhancement/transformational technologies
  • Modelling
  • Simulation
  • Prototyping
  • Manufacturing design and development
  • Analytics
  • Photonics
  • Information and telecommunications technologies
  • Industrial instrumentation
  • Alpha and beta testing
  • Characterization
  • Failure analysis
  • Materials testing
Sectors of application
  • Clean technology
  • Energy
  • Environmental technologies and related services
  • Life sciences, pharmaceuticals and medical equipment
  • Manufacturing and processing
  • Fabrication and prototyping—thin-film deposition: Physical vapor deposition (PVD) equipment (sputtering, evaporation); atomic layer deposition (ALD); electroplating wet bench; spray coating systems; tube furnaces (oxidation)
  • Fabrication and prototyping—lithography and patterning: maskless aligner; mask aligners (micron-scale patterning); mask writer; nanoimprinter (pattern replication and stamping); wafer bonder (silicon/glass wafer bonding)
  • Fabrication and prototyping—etching and cleaning: Wet benches (wet etches for metals, oxides, silicon; substrate and pre-deposition cleaning); deep reactive ion etcher (DRIE; deep silicon etching); reactive ion etcher (RIE; dielectric—fluorine-based); xenon difluoride (XeF₂) etcher (MEMS silicon release); plasma stripper; vapour hydrofluoric acid (HF) etcher (silicon dioxide - SiO2 - release)
  • Fabrication and prototyping—characterization and finishing: Ellipsometer (thin-film characterization); reflectometer (film thickness measurement); profilometer (surface topography); laser machining system (micromachining of parts and microfluidic devices); critical point dryer (MEMS release); dicing saw (wafer segmentation); probe station (electrical characterization of devices)
  • Materials and device testing—microscopy: Scanning electron microscopes (imaging, composition analysis, focused ion beam milling for cross-section and lift-out); scanning transmission electron microscope (imaging, crystallinity, compositional analysis); cryo and low‑vacuum electron microscopy; atomic force microscope (atomic-resolution topographic maps, electrical and mechanical property analysis); helium ion microscope (imaging non‑conductive samples)
  • Materials and device testing—spectroscopy and composition: X‑ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) system (surface chemistry analysis); inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP‑MS, trace elemental analysis including laser ablation capability); X‑ray diffractometer (XRD, crystal structure determination); small‑angle X‑ray scattering (SAXS, nanoscale characterization for polymers, particles, proteins, etc.)
  • Materials and device testing—electrochemical testing: Fuel cell test stations and single‑cell fuel‑cell performance analysis
  • Advanced spectroscopy and imaging research (LASIR): Pulsed laser systems (X‑ray to infrared; femtosecond to nanosecond pulse durations); X‑ray absorption spectroscopy system; Terahertz spectroscopy system; two‑photon laser scanning confocal microscope; transient absorption spectroscopy system; fluorescence lifetime measurement systems (millisecond to femtosecond timescales)

•    Authentix, Inc.
•    Ionomr Innovations Inc.
•    Photonic Inc.
•    Imasco Minerals Inc.
•    Lucent BioSciences, Inc.
•    D-Wave Quantum Inc.