This is the sixteenth annual research review of the Institute for Microelectronics. During the first fifteen years of its existence our annual review was distributed in a printed version with unchanged layout and extent. In order to move with the times we have decided to spread our review electronically from now on. Nevertheless, this does not change the basic structure and the extent of information except that some demonstrative figures are also included.

The staff, financed by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture, consists as in the past of ten full-time employees: the dean of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, the head of the institute, two additional professors, three scientists, a secretary, and two technical assistants. Eighteen additional scientists are funded through scientific projects supported by our industrial partners, by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF), by the Christian Doppler Gesellschaft (CDG), and by the EC Framework Programme.

Regarding the status of the EC projects, the projects MULSIC, UPPER+ and NESTOR are being contined and four new projects within the Information Society Technologies (IST) program, named TARGET, SINANO, EUROSOI, and PROMENADE have been started. Additionally, two projects funded by the Austrian Science Fund have been initiated successfully. We are very happy to be able to report that our industrial partners have continued the cooperation. Furthermore, the work within the Christian Doppler Laboratory for Technology CAD in Microelectronics is progressing well.

Contrary to the prospering research projects, the internal situation of the university is grave. The reasons are on the one hand the new organizational structure due to a change in Austria's law coming into effect this year and on the other hand the low public purse resulting in economical measures. Compared to other institutes we are in a lucky situation, because last year we were able to purchase a powerful server which was made possible by a national programme for infrastructure improvement. On the strength of this computing power, which represents the main tool for our successful research as well as the trust of our cooperating partners in our scientific work, we are going to enter the next year of our institute with considerable expectations.