Growing a single crystal of ultra-pure silicon to a size that’s industrially useful is no mean feat, and relies on some tricks discovered in 1916 by Polish chemist Jan Czochralski.

Researchers at the University of Illinois have pulled off a laser first: they built a new kind of eye-safe laser that works ...

In a first for the field, researchers from The Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign ...

Silicon that has an ordered atomic structure. It is used in almost all integrated circuits in the electronics industry. Fabricated from quartzite, a pure form of sand, the quartzite is treated ...

A pure silicon crystal, called an ingot. Silicon isn't the only semiconducting substance on Earth -- it's not even the best semiconductor on Earth. What it is, ...

Pure silicon is never found in nature, but you can make pure silicon crystals from sand, which is primarily composed of quartz. Beyond its role in the natural world, silicon is an incredibly ...

A clever materials science technique that uses a silicon crystal as a sort of nanoscale vise to squeeze another crystal into a more useful shape may launch a new class of electronic devices that ...

Monocrystalline solar panels are made from a single, pure silicon crystal, giving them a uniform, black appearance. They have a higher efficiency rate, typically between 17% and 22%.

The researchers directed a focused, high-speed beam of pure silicon-28 at a silicon chip so the silicon-28 gradually replaced the silicon-29 atoms in the chip, reducing silicon-29 from 4.5% to two ...

When they encounter silicon-29 or silicon-30, which have different atomic masses, the phonons get confused and slow down, hampering heat transfer. That's no longer a concern with pure silicon-28.

Silicon is almost never found in a pure state in nature, and virtually always comes as a compound with other elements. It's most commonly found as a silicate (SiO 4, ...