A breakthrough discovery at UC San Diego may help aid the semiconductor industry’s quest to squeeze more information on chips to accelerate the performance of electronic devices. So far, the semiconductor industry has been successful in its consistent efforts to reduce feature size on a chip.

In what should be good news for integrated circuit manufacturers, recent studies by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have helped resolve two important questions about an emerging microcircuit manufacturing technology called nanoimprint lithography—yes, it can accurately stamp delicate insulating structures on advanced microchips, and, no, it doesn’t damage them, in fact it makes them better.

Using enzymes from E. coli bacteria, Duke University chemists and engineers have introduced a hundred-fold improvement in the precision of features imprinted to create microdevices such as labs-on-a-chip.

Researchers at the University of Illinois have discovered a way to generate light and reduce damage in a leading candidate for next-generation microelectronics lithography. The technique could help pack more power into smaller computer chips.