DOCFAM+ (DOCtoral training programme in Functional Advanced Materials: Towards a Better Future) is a new doctoral programme for the recruitment and training of 26 excellent doctoral researchers. It builds on the success and remarkable outcomes from the previous DOCFAM programme by providing a new dimension through highly interdisciplinary and intersectorial research. IMB-CNM participates in the programme, led by ICMAB-CSIC.

Recently, the Printed Electronics Laboratory at the Institute of Microelectronics of Barcelona (IMB-CNM) has become part of the distributed ICTS MicroNanoFabs, in which the Micro and Nano Fabrication Clean Room is integrated.

The IMB-CNM (CSIC) has co-organised, together with IREC and AEInnova, the first international congress on thermoelectrics to be held in person since the start of the pandemic in 2020.

Eloísa del Pino has visited some of the CSIC centers in Catalonia, to meet the staff and discuss the needs and challenges of the institutes. At the IMB-CNM, she has held a meeting with the Management team, has met with different groups and has toured the Micro and Nanofabrication Clean Room.

This unique location returns to full capacity today after an August in which most of the manufacturing processes were stopped in order to carry out the pertinent maintenance tasks at the facility. Normal activity is recovered with the incorporation of new equipment, such as the commissioning of the second new dichlorosilane cabin for the LPCVD (AFU) battery.

Luis Fonseca, director of the Institute of Microelectronics of Barcelona, appeared at the Catalan Parliament's Economy and Finance Committee to talk about semiconductor manufacturing in Catalonia, the FabCat initiative and the possibility of setting up a factory in the territory.

They want to support Catalonia as the headquarters of the semiconductor and microchip industry.

The ICTS MicroNanoFabs is a network of clean rooms dedicated to micro and nano manufacturing that has three delocalized nodes, the Clean Room of the IMB-CNM (CSIC) and those of the ISOM-UPM and NTC-UPV. The coordination is renewed every two years and the IMB-CNM takes over from ISOM-UPM.