Our staff
Professor Simon Fleming
Academic Director
Simon is the Academic Director and Deputy Director of the ANFF-NSW Node. Simon's background is in photonics, focusing mainly on optical fibre, spanning from materials and fabrication through to devices.
A/Prof Sergio Leon-Saval
Associate Academic Director FBG Facility
Sergio is Associate Academic Director of the Advanced FBG Facility. He is the Director of the Sydney Astrophotonics Instrumentation Laboratory and his background is in the field of specialty optical fibres, astrophotonics and optical instrumentation systems.
Nelson Briones
Facility and Program Manager
Nelson has more than 20 years of experience in the semiconductor industry before joining RPF. He has an aptitude for leading groups of technical workforce providing equipment and process engineering support within high-volume fast-paced manufacturing and research environment.
Alison Robertson
Operations Manager
Alison has significant operations and project management experience gained across research, medical and financial institutions. She has a proven track record transforming work models to enhance efficiencies and improve outcomes for organisations and groups. She looks forward to applying her experience and skills in this role at the Research & Prototype Foundry.
Simon Ruffell
Quantum & Semiconductor Engagement Manager
Simon has experience in R&D process engineering in the leading-edge semiconductor industry and has led technical projects from research through to high volume manufacturing. He previously led the fabrication team and managed the facility at Microsoft Quantum in Sydney. Prior to this, Simon worked for Applied Materials (leading equipment supplier for major chip manufacturers) in the US for 10 years. He had roles ranging from R&D scientist to technical director where he led engineering teams from R&D through productisation of a brand-new patterning and etch tool and introduction into tsmc and Intel’s R&D and manufacturing fabs. Simon has a master’s degree in Electronic and Electrical Engineering from the UK and did his PhD in Physics as a Commonwealth Scholar in Canada.
Lars Goran Edvell
Senior Process Engineer: Advanced FBG Facility
Goran Edvell has 20+ years of experience in the photonics industry with special interest in R&D, design, and manufacturing of application specific Fibre Bragg Gratings. Goran has a MSc in Applied Physics and Electrical Engineering from Linkoping University, Sweden.
Dr Liguo Luo
Senior Process Engineer: Advanced FBG Facility
Liguo has more than 20 years’ R&D, engineering, and production experience in photonics. His expertise is in photonics devices including fibre Bragg gratings (FBGs), planar lightwave circuits, and fibre lasers. He worked extensively on development of fabrication processes for high performance and high quality FBG devices. As a senior process engineer, he is responsible for developing, engineering and fabricating processes at the Advanced FBG Facility. Liguo received his PhD in Optics from Shandong University.
Lim Wu Sim
Senior Process Engineer- Nanofabrication
Lim has been part of Australia's semiconductor industry for more than a decade, with experience in variety of projects across academia and industry, most recently working in Microsoft's team developing a quantum computer. He is knowledgeable in end-to-end device fabrication, process development and integration.
Dr Jason Hwang
Senior Process Engineer: Quantum Technologies
Jason has expertise in nanofabrication of quantum electronic devices, particularly in electron beam lithography, metal deposition, and liftoff. He completed a PhD at UNSW where he focused on building silicon CMOS quantum devices for spin-based quantum computing. Jason is responsible for various tools and processes including electron beam lithography, SEM, ellipsometer, ALD, evaporator, sputterer, HF wet etch, wire bonding and die bonding.
Dr Gloria Qiu
Senior Process Engineer
Gloria received her PhD in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Houston, USA. Her expertise is in magnetic thin film deposition and nanostructure patterning for bit-patterned media application. She has also worked extensively on magnetic biosensors. As Senior Process Engineer, Gloria is responsible for the deposition and dry etching tools.
Jacky He
Process Engineer: Nanofabrication
Jacky is responsible for the electron-beam lithography system and has expertise in a variety of nanofabrication techniques. As a process engineer at ANFF-NSW University of Sydney, he has expertise in CAD design, e-beam and photolithography, thin-film deposition, and wet chemical processes.
Ethel Ilagan
Process Engineer: Optical Lithography
Ethel has extensive experience in photolithography, as well expertise in wet processing and microfluidic fabrication. As Process Engineer: Optical Lithography, she is responsible for the photolithography tools.
Roger Ackroyd
Process Engineer
Roger spent the last four years working as a nanofabrication process engineer for Microsoft Quantum. In this role, and prior to this at UNSW, he worked on several devices and materials systems, including superconductors, semiconductors, qubits, microwave resonators, Josephson junctions, and SQUIDs. His focus is on process development, process improvement, and scale-up.
Derui Yin
Packaging Engineer
Derui Yin is a Senior Process Engineer specialising in packaging at the University of Sydney. With extensive experience in the semiconductor industry and a Master's degree in Electrical & Electronics Engineering, he brings advanced knowledge in 2.5D, 3D-IC, and wafer-level packaging. His expertise includes managing packaging capabilities, providing technical support to researchers, and ensuring proper facility maintenance.
Steve Moody
Senior Technical Officer: Characterisation
Steve's expertise is in characterisation, having come to us from a role with Microscopy Australia. As Senior Technical Officer: Characterisation, he is particularly focused ion beam (cross-sectioning, manipulation, lift-out) and multi-beam nanofabrication.
Justin Digweed
Technical Officer: Fibre Fabrication
Justin manages the polymer optical fibre draw facilty. Justin's experience has been gained from manufacturing Specialty Optical Fibres at the University of Southampton from 1989 until 1994 when he came to Australia to help set up the Optical Fibre Technology Centre at Sydney University. His background covers MCVD systems, equipment support and high volume electronics manufacturing in a mass production environment in Asia.
Selvaraj Nagarajan
Senior Equipment Engineer
Raj has significant equipment maintenance and installation experience gained across semiconductor research and manufacturing industries. He has a proven track record of providing equipment and process engineering support to enhance best outcomes for organisations and groups. Recent roles at Microsoft Quantum involved contributing to and managing the day-to-day Microsoft cleanroom equipment operations and improvements projects.
Lawrence Farrar
Cleanroom Technical Officer
Lawrence is responsible for photomask fabrication, general cleanroom operations and providing expertise in a variety of nanofabrication techniques. He has experience in electron beam and photo-lithography, electron microscopy, and materials characterisation from his PhD research at RMIT University.
Saw Saw Nyi Nyi Latt
Cleanroom Equipment Officer
Saw is a Cleanroom Equipment Officer responsible for process tools and equipment maintenance at ANFF-NSW University of Sydney. He worked at A*STAR, Singapore’s leading research facility for more than 7 years supporting the installation and maintenance of SPTS’s DRIE and PECVD tools.
