UCLA’s Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, UC Santa Barbara, UC Berkeley, and Stanford University are teaming up to launch what will be one of the world’s largest joint research programs focusing on the pioneering technology called “spintronics.”

The Western Institute of Nanoelectronics’ administrative headquarters will be located at UCLA Engineering, with scientific and technical responsibility distributed across all four campuses. Start-up grants will total $18.2-million over four years.

Kang Wang, UCLA professor of engineering, will direct the institute, working closely with co-directors David Awschalom at UCSB, Jeff Bokor at UCB, and Philip Wong at Stanford. Nearly 30 researchers will explore critically needed innovations in semiconductor technology. Around 10 researchers from the co-sponsoring semiconductor companies will work with students and faculty on all of the campuses.

Spintronics relies on the spin of an electron to carry information, and promises to minimize power consumption for next-generation electronics. Conventional electronic devices simply move these electric charges around, ignoring the spin on each electron that tags along for the ride. Spintronics aims to put that extra spin action to work, corralling electrons into a smooth, reactive chain of motion.

“With this new institute, we are talking about an unprecedented opportunity to help define a technology that can exploit the idiosyncrasies of the quantum world to provide key improvements over existing technologies,” Wang said. “Simply put, today’s devices can’t get much smaller and still function properly and effectively.”

The Western Institute of Nanoelectronics has been organized to leverage what are now considered the world’s best interdisciplinary talents in the field of nanoelectronics. The institute’s mission is to explore and develop advanced research devices, circuits, and nanosystems with performance beyond conventional devices based on complementary metal oxide semiconductors.

“We are delighted to join with our colleagues at UCLA, UCB, and Stanford to establish the Western Institute for Nanoelectronics and bring together a remarkable group of scientists and engineers aimed at exploring emerging opportunities in the nascent field of spintronics,” said David Awschalom, professor of physics, electrical and computer engineering, and director of UCSB’s Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation.

“The institute is an experiment in itself, attempting to create a new research paradigm for faculty and students to interact with industrial colleagues,” he said. “This is an exciting opportunity for UCSB to build on its successful track record of interdisciplinary science and use the enabling environment within the California Nanosystems Institute to launch this endeavor.”

Evelyn Hu, co-director of the California NanoSystems Institute, added, “This is a wonderful way of leveraging the investments that the state and federal governments have made in our campus, joining with industry, and allowing us to contribute to the development of next-generation technologies. It also provides an unparalleled opportunity for our students to understand at first hand the linkage between research and the economy.”

A portion of the Western Institute will be housed in new laboratories within the brand-new California NanoSystems Institute currently under construction at UCLA and UCSB.