ALISO VIEJO, Calif.—Feb. 7, 2012—Microsemi Corporation (Nasdaq: MSCC), a leading provider of semiconductor solutions differentiated by power, security, reliability and performance, today announced its participation in a multi-disciplinary consortium tasked with developing innovative CMOS-compatible, high-temperature sensors that help reduce carbon emissions and drive energy consumption savings. The European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7ICT) is funding the majority of the SOI-HITS (Silicon on Insulator High Temperature Systems) project, which is slated for completion by the end of August 2014.

• Microsemi will lead and manage the SOI-HITS project, and be responsible for high-temperature packaging and system integration activities.  Additional consortium members include:
• Cambridge CMOS Sensors, a spin out SME, will exploit the ‘revolutionary’ smart technology for gas sensors developed by the Universities of Cambridge and Warwick;
• Cambridge University, a world renowned body, will provide overall scientific coordination and technical leadership for the nano sensor design and fabrication within harsh environments;
• Cissoid, a leader in high-temperature semiconductor solutions, will design a high-temperature, highly integrated, intelligent interface circuit for the gas sensor;
• Honeywell Romania will be responsible for the demonstrator design and testing; will oversee the exploitation activities of the project; will be involved in gas sensors design and fabrication, and in the numerical simulation of the sensors and sensing system developed within the project;
• IREC will be responsible for scientific research related to gas sensing structures, design, numerical simulations, test structure fabrication and sensing layer selection;
• Université Catholique de Louvain will design and test a water vapour concentration sensor, a UV photodiode and associated interface electronic circuits, for high temperature operation;
• Warwick University, a world renowned Microsensors & Bioelectronics Laboratory (formerly Sensors Research Laboratory), will be responsible for the characterization and testing of the gas sensors under harsh environmental conditions.

About the Project

For this project, SOI-HITS will develop sensors with a built-in electronic interface designed to work in harsh high-temperature environments, something that is difficult to achieve at the present time due to the limits of conventional sensor and control electronics and packaging.

The development of a high-temperature SIP (system in a package) will enable real-world technology demonstrators with the capability of on-chip processing electronics, including drive circuitry, filters, amplifiers, processing circuits and analog to digital interfaces, operating at 225o centigrade.

The extension of the platform to optical detectors, such as ultra-violet (UV) photodiode flame detectors and infrared (IR) combined sources/detectors, will also be explored.

About Microsemi

Microsemi Corporation (Nasdaq: MSCC) offers a comprehensive portfolio of semiconductor solutions for: aerospace, defense and security; enterprise and communications; and medical, alternative energy and industrial markets. Products include high-performance, high-reliability analog and RF devices, mixed-signal and RF ICs, ultra low-power radios, customizable SoCs, FPGAs and complete subsystems. Microsemi is headquartered in Aliso Viejo, Calif., and has approximately 3,000 employees globally. Learn more at www.microsemi.com.