1st American Workshop on Ellipsometry

February 28 – March 3, 2027, in Lincoln, NE

Keynote & Invited Speakers

From Monday through Wednesday, March 1–3, 2027, Oral and Poster Sessions will take place in the Conference Center on the Nebraska Innovation Campus, including an outstanding Keynote and a lineup of excellent Invited Speakers.  The Keynote is intended to provide a high-level overview, summarizing developments in ellipsometry and related techniques over the past ~5 years, and looking ahead at a broad range of applications that will drive future advances.  Invited Talks are intended to introduce advanced concepts in instrumentation and data analysis, as well as specialized applications, that are highly topical or emerging.

Please find the up-to-date Schedule of Events in the Abstract Book.


Keynote

KLA Corporation

Film and Critical Dimension Metrology Challenges in the Semiconductor Industry

Shankar Krishnan received his Ph.D. from Rice University, where he developed novel spectroscopic ellipsometers to study high-temperature liquid materials.  He was a Director and Principal Scientist at Containerless Research, Inc., where he developed a series of high-speed polarimeters and ellipsometers to study transient events on millisecond/microsecond timescales.  Since 2001, he has worked at KLA Corporation, where he has led the development of numerous spectroscopic ellipsometers and reflectometers for film and critical dimension metrology.  He currently serves as a KLA Fellow and Vice President of Engineering.  He has published widely on spectroscopic ellipsometry and high-speed polarimetry, and holds over 110 patents.


Invited Speakers

Hiroyuki Fujiwara

Gifu University, Japan

Advances in Deep Learning-Based Spectroscopic Ellipsometry

Hiroyuki Fujiwara received his Ph.D. degree from the Tokyo Institute of Technology.  He was a research associate at The Pennsylvania State University during 1996–1998.  In 1998, he joined the Electrotechnical Laboratory of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry in Japan.  Later in 2007, he became a team leader of the Research Center for Photovoltaics at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) in Japan.  He is currently a Professor in the Department of Electrical, Electronic, and Computer Engineering at Gifu University.

Argonne National Laboratory

In Situ Combination of Spectroscopic Ellipsometry and Calorimetry

Ashley Bielinski received her bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, in 2014;  and her master’s and Ph.D. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan in 2019.  She currently works as an Assistant Materials Scientist at Argonne National Laboratory.  Her research centers around atomic layer deposition, a surface synthesis technique that uses sequential surface reactions to deposit material onto a surface in a vacuum chamber.  She developed a new technique for studying ALD reactions that combines in situ ellipsometry with calorimetry measurements.  She was recognized with an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship 2015-2018, the Maria Goeppert Mayer Postdoctoral Fellowship 2019-2022, and the Physical Sciences and Engineering Early Investigator Named Award by Argonne National Laboratory 2022.

Brigham Young University

Multi-Instrument Characterization of Thin Films: How and Why Ellipsometry Matters

Matthew Linford graduated with a B.S. in Chemistry from Brigham Young University (BYU) in 1990 and received M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Materials Science & Engineering and Chemistry, respectively, from Stanford University in 1996.  After a Post-Doc at the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces in Golm (previously Berlin), Germany, with Helmut Möhwald studying polyelectrolyte multilayers, he worked in industry for three years.  In 2000, he took a position as a faculty member at BYU and is now a full professor.  While at BYU, he has studied thin-film characterization using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and spectroscopic ellipsometry; statistical methods for data analysis; new materials for separations science (chromatography); thin-film deposition by atomic layer deposition and sputtering; new materials for long-term digital data storage; and the chemomechanical functionalization of silicon.  He has more than 400 publications, which include peer-reviewed papers, conference proceedings, book chapters, peer-reviewed contributions to Surface Science Spectra, commercial application notes, tutorial articles, and more than 40 patents.  In 2014, he became a Fellow of the American Vacuum Society (AVS).

Connie B. Roth

Emory University

Ellipsometry in Polymer Physics

Connie Barbara Roth received her B.Sc. in Physics from McMaster University (Ontario, Canada), and her M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Guelph (Ontario, Canada).  She completed postdoctoral positions at Simon Fraser University (British Columbia, Canada) and Northwestern University (Chicago, IL).  She has been a faculty member at Emory University since 2007, receiving tenure in 2013, and was promoted to full professor in the Department of Physics in 2021.  Her research falls under the area of Experimental Soft Matter Physics.  Her research interests include polymer materials, glass transition, physical aging, photophysics, miscibility, and phase separation, with particular interest in surface and interfacial effects observed at the nanoscale in thin films, nanostructured blends, and nanocomposite materials, as well as other perturbations such as external stresses and electric fields.  In 2016, she published an edited book on “Polymer Glasses” (CRC Press).

Anis Attiaoui

Stanford University

Spectroscopic Ellipsometry Across Length Scales: Quantum Confinement, Thermal Segregation, and Oxide Chemistry in Group-IV Heterostructures

Anis Attiaoui obtained his Ph.D. in Physics Engineering from École Polytechnique de Montréal, Canada, in January 2023, conducting research under the supervision of Prof. Oussama Moutanabbir. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Stanford University, where he works under the mentorship of Prof. Paul McIntyre. He specializes in the epitaxial growth of group-IV semiconductors via chemical vapor deposition and the optoelectronic characterization of materials, employing methods such as photoluminescence, photoreflectance, and absorption spectroscopy. He explores how short-range ordering affects the optical properties of semiconductor materials by integrating Extended X-ray Absorption Fine Structure analysis with photoluminescence spectroscopy. He is also leading a project at Stanford focused on creating innovative two-dimensional metasurfaces designed to enhance light emission and absorption in the near-infrared to mid-infrared spectral regions, utilizing group-IV semiconductor nanowires.

Onto Innovation

Optical Critical Dimension Metrology with Spectroscopic Ellipsometry: The Workhorse of Process Control in Advanced Nodes

Chung-Hwa Wang received his Ph.D. from National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan. In 2013, he worked at Nanometric Inc, where he developed novel spectroscopic ellipsometers and metrology solutions for customers’ leading-edge process technologies. He currently serves as the head of an application engineering team at Onto Innovation. He led the development of metrology solutions on numerous spectroscopic ellipsometers,  reflectometers, acoustic and X-ray metrology for film and critical dimension metrology in industry.


Catering during Session Breaks

Coffee & Snacks will be served during Oral Session breaks Sunday through Wednesday, sponsored by _TBD_. 
Lunches will be served on Monday and Tuesday, sponsored by _TBD_. 
Refreshments will be served during the Poster Session on Monday evening, sponsored by _TBD_. 

  • Third Announcement—Call for Award Nominations

    As part of the upcoming 1st American Workshop on Ellipsometry (AWE-1), to be held February 28 – March 3, 2027, in Lincoln, NE, we are pleased to announce this Call for Award Nominations.  The following Awards will recognize and honor excellent achievements at different levels.

    Award Categories

    NAEA Fellow

    For the purpose of providing recognition to deserving Members of the North American Ellipsometry Association (NAEA) who have made sustained and outstanding technical contributions in areas of interest to the Association, one current Member may be elected as a “Fellow of the Association.”  The nominee to be inducted as NAEA Fellow shall have made outstanding contributions in research, engineering, technical or managerial leadership, and/or education for a period of 10 years or more.

    Rasheed M. A. Azzam Medal

    The Rasheed M. A. Azzam Medal is intended to celebrate an individual or a group of individuals for recent, groundbreaking contributions to the field of ellipsometry and related techniques, whether through instrument innovations;  through academic, technical, or industrial applications;  or through mentorship, education, and outreach.

    Student Awards

    Student Awards are intended to recognize undergraduate or graduate students for best oral presentations and for best posters.  Multiple awardees are anticipated.

    Students must identify their undergraduate or graduate student status upon Abstract Submission to participate in the Student Award competitions.  All presenting authors who have indicated student status at the time of abstract submission are automatically considered.

    Nomination Instructions

    Please submit Nominations for the NAEA Fellow and/or for the Rasheed M. A. Azzam Medal to the Awards Committee at awards@ellipsometry.us.  Nominations and self-nominations are permitted.  Please click the respective link above to find more information about each Award, including the required materials for Award Nominations.

    Please submit Award Nominations no later than December 31, 2026!

    Award winners will be informed by February 14, 2027.  Student Award winners will be determined based on evaluations during the workshop.

    Thank you for helping us celebrate excellence in ellipsometry.  We look forward to your Nominations!

    Best regards,
    AWE-1 Awards Committee

  • Second Announcement—Call for Abstracts

    The 1st American Workshop on Ellipsometry (AWE-1) will be held February 28 – March 3, 2027, at the Conference Center on the Nebraska Innovation Campus in Lincoln, Nebraska.

    The workshop Committees invite students, early-career professionals, and experienced leaders across academic, public, and industrial sectors to contribute an abstract. International participants are welcome and expressly encouraged to attend.

    AWE-1 is especially dedicated to the participation of undergraduate and graduate students.  Accordingly, we aim to keep students’ attendance and lodging costs as affordable as possible—thanks to the generous support of our Sponsors. Workshop Registration will be $200 for Students and $400 for Regular attendees.

    The Technical Program will include a broad range of topics in ellipsometry, polarimetry, and related techniques that utilize polarized light to characterize bulk materials, thin films, surfaces, interfaces, and nanostructures under both static and dynamic conditions. Topics will cover theory, instrumentation & data analysis, and applications across physics, chemistry, materials science, and life sciences, as well as engineering and metrology.

    Please prepare abstracts according to the Author Instructions
    and submit via the Abstract Submission System
    before October 31, 226!

    Abstracts should cover work that has been published recently or is yet unpublished. Abstracts must contain sufficient information to allow for peer review by the Program Committee. Abstracts will be evaluated upon receipt. Acceptance notifications will be sent at the beginning of November 2026. Please submit early!

    In the abstract, please identify the corresponding and presenting authors. For student presenters who wish to participate in the Student Award competition, please identify the student status in the abstract. If the presenting author cannot attend the workshop, please arrange for another co-author to attend and present, and inform the workshop organizers as soon as possible.

    Contributed presentations will be included in a digital Abstract Booklet and scheduled into Oral or Poster Sessions with dates and times assigned as the Program Schedule is finalized. The Abstract Booklet & Program Schedule will be published on the workshop website. Oral Sessions are currently anticipated as single-track.

    The Technical Program includes complimentary Tutorials; Oral and Poster Sessions with a Keynote, 101 Lectures, and Invited Talks; and Social Events—providing ample opportunities for scientific and technical discussions and professional networking.  An Awards Ceremony will celebrate an inaugural NAEA Fellow, recipient of the Rasheed M. A. Azzam Medal, and multiple Student Awardees. A simultaneous Industry Exhibition will showcase the latest equipment developments.

    We look forward to seeing you in Lincoln, NE, in early 2027!
    Please direct any questions or inquiries to awe1@ellipsometry.us