American Institute for Manufacturing Integrated Photonics (AIM Photonics)

MIT is a key player in a new $600 million public-private partnership announced today by the Obama administration to help strengthen high-tech U.S.-based manufacturing.

Physically headquartered in New York state and led by the State University of New York Polytechnic Institute (SUNY Poly), the American Institute for Manufacturing Integrated Photonics (AIM Photonics) will bring government, industry, and academia together to advance domestic capabilities in integrated photonic technology and better position the U.S. relative to global competition.

Federal funding of $110 million will be combined with some $500 million from AIM Photonics’ consortium of state and local governments, manufacturing firms, universities, community colleges, and nonprofit organizations across the country.

The public-private partnership announced today aims to spur these twin goals, improving integration of photonic systems while revitalizing U.S. manufacturing. The consortium includes universities, community colleges, and businesses in 20 states. Six state governments, including that of Massachusetts, are also supporting the project.

MIT faculty will manage important parts of the program: Michael Watts, an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science, will lead the technological innovation in silicon photonics. Lionel Kimerling, the Thomas Lord Professor in Materials Science and Engineering, will lead a program in education and workforce development.

Within the new alliance, MIT will lead technological innovation in silicon photonics. That task will be managed by Professor Watts.

MIT will also host AIM Photonics’ program in education and workforce development, which Kimerling will direct. This will include developing educational materials — ranging from K-12 through continuing education -- to prepare future employees for this emerging industry, including teaching on the design of integrated photonic devices. MIT will also lead workforce development, with an emphasis on including veterans, underrepresented minorities, and other students, by developing a variety of materials to teach about the new technologies.

MIT will work to support internships, apprenticeships, and other forms of hands-on training in a national network of industry and university partners. The effort will also support an industry-wide roadmap to help align the technology supply chain with new manufacturing platforms.

Other major members of AIM Photonics include the University of Arizona, the University of Rochester, and the University of California at Santa Barbara. In addition to the Department of Defense, federal funding for the project will come from the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, the National Institute for Standards and Technology, and NASA.

The AIM Photonics Academy launched in 2016 as the education, workforce development adn roadmapping arm of AIM Photonics, one of 14 public-private manufacutring innovaiton institutes launched as part of the 2014 Revialize American Manufacturing Innovaiton Act.

AIM Photonics Academy, an initiative of the AIM Photonics Institute (Manufacturing USA), hosted a week-long Summer Academy program on the Fundamentals of Integrated Photonics at MIT. Close to 60 attendees learned about foundational principles of device and circuit design, integrated process flow and manufacturing control. They also networked with colleagues from academia and industry, met leading Electronic Photonic Design Automation vendors and reviewed their software tools, and had an introduction to packaging and testing principles in MIT’s flagship Education and Practice Factory. Throughout the week, attendees worked in collaborative teams on a design project that brought together the program’s learning objectives. They attended for a three-day focus on design or a full week, which included the manufacturing component.