DR. MACDONALD, PhD – Co-Founder
Dr. MacDonald is an Emeritus Professor of Mechanical Engineering at UCSB. Before coming to UCSB, Prof. MacDonald was the Chairman of the School of Electrical Engineering at Cornell University.
From 1997 to 1999, Noel served as Director of the Federal Microsystems Technology Office at DARPA. In 2000 Dr. MacDonald was elected to the National Academy of Engineering for his contributions to the development of the Scanning Auger Microprobe and Micromachined Micro-instruments.
Noel is an expert on MEMS and a pioneer of the Titanium-based MEMS field. He has generated two start-up companies based on 55 MEMS patents (from Cornell University) produced by DARPA research. Two companies, CALIENT Networks and Kionex, have used the DARPA derived IPs. CALIENT’s technology, based on deep-silicon plasma etch process technology, is used to make 3D Optical MEMS mirrors. These all optical switches have been deployed on the internet in Japan and are currently being used by the major Telecom companies in the United States and Europe. Kionex, Ithaca, NY uses the IP from the MacDonald former group at Cornell. Kionex is one of the top three producers of MEMS tri-axis accelerometers in the world.
Prof. MacDonald has written or co-authored over 100 papers and several book chapters and holds 61 patents.