Australian manufacturing industry's plans for investment in the development and promotion of digital television products and equipment is under threat unless Australia's digital terrestrial television market is stimulated, two leading industry associations have warned.

International Sematech (ISMT) has developed an etch process that allows the removal of high-k film from a wafer surface without damaging the underlying silicon.

A self-timed microchip has been developed by scientists in the UK to make smartcards more secure.

Engineers at Oregon State University have created a transparent transistor, a see-through electronics component that could potentially lead to many new products.

Despite the use of computer simulation, wind tunnel testing is still required to measure pressure changes and airflow speeds on the surfaces of new aircraft and automobile prototypes. Such testing is now done less with smoke visualisation and threads but more frequently with high-tech sensors which have the least influence on air flows. Film sensors made from piezoelectric materials provide one alternative. However, such films are difficult to apply - especially on rounded surfaces - and they do not adhere well under windy conditions. These disadvantages have been overcome with a varnish developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Plymer Research IAP.

Senko Advanced Components has announced they have distributions rights for the E-2000 fibre optic connectors and adapters manufactured by the Swiss based firm Reichle & De-Massari (R&M). The line includes compact and standard fibre optic connectors, connector levers, housing clips, adaptors, adaptor frames and mount supports.

Metromatics has been appointed Australian and New Zealand distributor for UK based electronics organisation, Harwin. It manufactures a range of electronics products including board to board connectors, surface mount connectors, IP sockets, PC board sockets, radial taped terminals, gripper sockets, track pins and FPC connectors.

A diamond film developed by chemists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, could possibly produce a compact sensor that could continuously scan airports, stadiums and other places where large numbers of people gather, for the slightest trace of biological weapons. Coupled with modern electronics, the new sensors, about the size of a postage stamp, could not only be able to detect nearby biological agents, but also sound alarms and even call for help.

The Australian Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers' Association (AEEMA) and the Ausatralian Contstruction Industry Forum (ACIF) has announced the co-convening of a one-day 'Cleaner, Greener, Smarter" - themed conference to be held in Sydney on Wednesday 3 September. It will form part of the Electrix exhibition at Darling Harbour.

Teradyne has expanded it operation to China with the opening of an office and manufacturing facility in Shanghai. The office will serve Chinese and multinational customers requiring test system for a range of semiconductor devices, test and inspection systems for printed circuit boards and high-density connectors, backplanes and complex system integration and test services.

Electronic wastes - discarded computers, televisions, mobile phones, audio equipment and batteries - can leach lead and other substances that may seep into groundwater supplies.

The progression toward smaller and smaller electrical and mechanical components presents challenges in creating devices on scales measured in microns and nanometers. One solution may be to develop materials that automatically arrange themselves in useful patterns.

Jillian M Buriak of West Lafayette, Ind., will receive the 2003 Award for Pure Chemistry from the American Chemical Society on 25 March for developing ways to attach molecular signals directly to silicon chips, with an eye toward ever smaller electronic devices and perhaps even biological implants.

Optical fibres regularly carry billions of phone conversations and other data transmissions every day and are a fundamental part of optical sensing and numerous medical applications. The photonic devices responsible for this traffic are being made even more efficient and versatile by handing over some of the switching and reconfiguring chores to the fibres themselves - the trunk lines linking all the optical nodes.

A molecular switch took only 47 zepto-joules to operate in a recent experiment, 10,000 times less than transistor switches used in current high-speed computers. The molecular switch consists of rotating one of the four phenyl legs attached to a complicated porphyrin molecule from one stable position to another.