Abstract
The 8th Workshop on Micromachining, Micromechanics and Microsystems was held at Southampton University in Great Britain between 31 August and 2 September 1997. The aim of the workshop was to promote research in micromechanics and encourage its application in Europe with the intention of making the microsystems community better equipped to compete in the international market place.
There were about 100 delegates at the workshop and most were involved with the 50 contributed papers. The six invited papers reviewed specialist areas ranging from the macroscale of mechanical devices such as pressure sensors and microphones and their manufacturing technologies, through microfluidic devices for bioengineering to the recent advances in nanoengineering for atom and molecule manipulation. In the spirit of the workshop the contributed papers were discussed at poster sessions which followed immediately after short oral presentations.
Once again the collaboration with IOPP has continued with this special issue which contains the best of the papers from the conference. I am grateful to all the referees and the journal Editor for their help reviewing the articles quickly and efficiently.
The workshop was a great success; much good work was presented and discussed. It is hoped that many of the new ideas in papers which are now published here will be developed into a suitable form for publication as regular papers in the Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering.
A good workshop atmosphere was generated by having the conference centred on the University campus with all facilities, including accommodation, close at hand. The staff and students of the Microfabrication Facility are especially thanked for their contributions to the tours of the laboratories and help with all the local arrangements. The Technical Programme Committee: J R Morante (University of Barcelona), R Puers (University of Leuven) and Per Ohlkers (SensoNor ASA, Norway), are thanked for their help throughout the conference planning and implementation. Michael Koch is especially thanked for his Powerpoint displays and paper scheduling.
Lastly it is a pleasure to thank all the participants for contributing to the workshop. It was their enthusiasm that ensured that micromechanics research is being promoted and applications and collaborations are being established and consolidated.
A G R Evans
MME'97 Chairman Department of Electronics and Computer Science Southampton University