The tour of the Micron facility was extremely interesting. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable and just a cool guy in general. He did not even hesitate on answering any questions. First we watched a short presentation on how Micron has there hand in virtually everything electronic that I own. Then we went over to the production side of the building and watched the magic happen. It was very interesting in the production building, a large portion of the floor we were on was lit with yellow lights. This is because white light is really a combination of every color of light. Scientifically, this means many different wavelengths, which could be dangerous to the production of the wafers. The most interesting part of the whole tour was when the tour guide explained to us the size of the chips being manufactured. Were talking tiny, like thousands of times smaller than a strand of hair. Another interesting thing was the chemistry of it all. How Argon gas is used for cleaning the chips because it is inert and will not react with anything, and how the water must be purified so no reactions take place. Also the actual process of etching and smoothing out the wafers was interesting, he explained to us how a layer of some substance is put down and creates a sort of stencil for where the grooves need to be. It was all very interesting.
There are many jobs available at Micron. Electrical and Mechanical engineering are what the main components of the design and production consist of, Chemistry also plays a large role. There are a few internships available at Micron. One available at Micron in Idaho includes an intern as a product engineer, where you would oversee the design process, debugging and testing, and finally high-volume production. Other internships are available but would most likely consist carrying out the production phase and understanding how it works, and how it could work better.
I personally would not want to work at a place like Micron because the work done there does not highlight the work that I will be doing as a civil engineer. Also, I don’t particularly like the delicacy of it all. And anything that I build will be visible to the naked eye.
