AggieFab Nanofabrication Facility

Texas A&M Engineering · College Station · Brazos County

AggieFab is Texas A&M's shared nano- and microfabrication cleanroom, with 6,500 square feet of Class 100/1000 space in the Giesecke Engineering Research Building. It is the working fab behind the Center for Microdevices and Systems, whose $26.4M Texas CHIPS Act allocation is buying tools due by summer 2027.

Aug 2017Move into GERB done with $12M from TEES Fall 2017$5M nanopatterning equipment donation 2021$1.7M for etch and maskless lithographytools 2023Texas CHIPS Act funds CMDS at $26.4M Apr 9, 2026TSI groundbreaking at RELLIS Summer 2027CMDS tool installs and upgrades due
Cleanroom
6,500 sq ft
Total
11,000 sq ft
Class
100/1000
Director
Arum Han
County
Brazos
Sector
Chips and fabs

Overview

A Shared Cleanroom in the Texas A&M Research Park

AggieFab occupies the first floor of the Frederick E. Giesecke Engineering Research Building (GERB) at 1617 Research Parkway in College Station, sharing the floor with the Materials Characterization Facility. The cleanroom has a raised access floor, vertical laminar flow, and in-house deionized water, vacuum and nitrogen.

The facility grew out of the Solid State Group fabs of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), built up over about 20 years, and is dedicated to the memory of Henry F. Taylor. It moved into GERB in August 2017 with a $12M investment from the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station (TEES).

Profile
OperatorTexas A&M College of Engineering and TEES
LocationGERB, 1617 Research Parkway, College Station
DirectorArum Han, Associate Dean for Research
Cleanroom6,500+ sq ft, Class 100/1000
Support spaceAbout 4,500 sq ft
TotalAbout 11,000 sq ft
Opened in GERBAugust 2017
Main supportersECE, TEES, Division of Research

Tools

Lithography, Deposition, Etch and Metrology Under One Roof

AggieFab works on semiconductors, glass, polymers, crystals and flexible films. Named tools include:

  • Lithography: EVG 610 and Karl Suss MA-6 mask aligners, Heidelberg MLA150 maskless aligner, TESCAN MIRA3 e-beam writer, Nanoscribe Photonic Professional GT2 3D laser printer
  • Ion beam: Zeiss Orion helium ion microscope and FEI Helios DualBeam focused ion beam
  • Deposition: ASM atomic layer deposition (ALD), Lesker e-beam evaporators and sputter systems, Clustex multi-target sputter, Oxford PECVD, Tystar LPCVD, parylene coater
  • Etch: Oxford ICP reactive ion etch, Oxford Estrelas deep silicon etch, Nordson March RIE, Tegal asher
  • Metrology: Bruker DektakXT and Veeco optical profilers, thin-film analyzer, four-point probe, probe station
  • Packaging: K&S wire bonder, EVG 501 wafer bonder, dicing saws

Funding

Texas CHIPS Act Money Arrives Through CMDS

The 2023 Texas CHIPS Act gave the A&M System $226.4M, of which $26.4M went to the Center for Microdevices and Systems (CMDS). CMDS operates mainly through AggieFab, and the money buys nanofabrication and metrology tools and facility infrastructure upgrades. Han said in April 2026 that procurement and upgrades should finish by summer 2027.

The larger share funds the 300mm cleanroom at the Texas A&M Semiconductor Institute at RELLIS, due in early 2028. AggieFab handles small-wafer research and device prototyping on the main campus; TSI adds production-scale tools eight miles away.

AggieFab capital history
YearSourceAmount
2017TEES investment for the GERB move$12M
2017Nanopatterning and deposition equipment donation$5M
EarlierTexas A&M Research Development Fund, patterning tools$1.5M
2021Research Development Fund, etch and maskless lithography$1.7M
2023Texas CHIPS Act via CMDS$26.4M

Record

Dataset Record

Sources
AggieFab (aggiefab.tamu.edu), AggieFab facility description, Texas A&M Division of Research, Higher Ed Dive, Construction Dive, GovTech
Last verified
October 2026