WORK EXPERIENCE
Asylum Research
Oxford Instruments AFM
Sr. Product Engineer
April 2024 - present
Sr. Manufacturing Engineer
April 2022 - April 2024
Service Engineer
November 2019 - September 2021
In my current role as a Product Engineer, I am part of the core engineering team responsible for development of new instruments and accessories for academic and industrial research. I am proficient in designing and debugging sensitive analog, mixed-signal and digital circuits across complicated opto-electro-mechanical systems. I am also adept at mechanical design, regularly designing parts for a variety of fabrication methods spanning machining, sheet metal, 3D printing (FDM, SLA, SLS), including spatially sensitive integration with electronics across rigid, rigid-flex, and flex PCBA.
My recent work has involved the complete prototype and productionization of a high performance imaging stage. This project involved electrical and mechanical design of an XY stage with a homegrown controller and firmware from the ground up, capable of closed-loop sub-micron resolution and mechanics stiff enough to image atoms on.
In my previous role with service and manufacturing, I also created and maintained a repository of factory and field service manuals, fully documented with rich media and revision control, for over 120 documents.
Keysight Technologies
Fabrication Manufacturing Engineer
September 2021 - April 2022
Keysight Santa Clara produces interferometers and specialty optical instrumentation, both for in house and customer designs. I acted as the tool manager for the sputtering and evaporation thin film coating equipment. I managed tool use, trained users, maintained the equipment, installed and helped commission a new large capacity HELIOS style sputtering chamber. Additionally while at Keysight I built a database used for tracking hundreds of spare parts and equipment maintenance records, and created a tool that linked spare parts consumption with regular maintenance work to suggest "safety stock" purchases and service schedules to coordinate with production in order to maximize equipment uptime and minimize cost.
Nanoscale Quantum Matter Lab
Research Assistant
Frolov Group
August 2018 - November 2019
I worked with the Frolov Group on several projects involving design, fabrication, and characterization of nanowire (FETs, quantum dots) and qubit (fluxonium) devices. Constructing the devices involved extensive use of the nanofabrication facility at Pitt, the NFCF. I also designed much of the hardware to support upgrading one of our fridge systems with many microwave and DC lines. Additionally, I managed the planning, sourcing, and installation of a new chiller system for the lab instruments.
The Art of Making (ENGR 1716)
Volunteer Teaching Assistant
Spring 2019
The Art of Making doesn't seem like a unique engineering course (prototyping, data-driven decision making being core premises), but it serves to offer one of the only truly independent, hands on experiences that the university has. Volunteering as a teaching assistant for this course was a wonderful opportunity to offer my skills to help students discover and grow their creative, inventive, and functional abilities.
Nanoionics and Electronics Laboratory
Research Assistant
Fullerton Group
January 2017 - August 2017
My research with the Fullerton Group was mainly oriented around characterization of few-layer TMD crystals for use in nano-scale devices. My work involved exfoliation of a variety of TMD crystals, physical characterization of exfoliated flakes using AFM, and simulation of electromechanical behavior of the devices using Comsol Multiphysics. I was able to present my work at several poster sessions.
WPTS-FM Radio Station
Engineering Director
University of Pittsburgh
August 2016 - December 2018
WPTS was one of the first extracurriculars that I joined at Pitt after I transferred. I volunteered for two semesters, and served as Engineering Director for two additional semesters. I was responsible for maintaining the station technology and electronics, diagnosing and repairing broken radio instruments, maintaining a catalog of station equipment, setting up and mixing bands for a weekly live show, and managing a staff of students. During my time at WPTS, we were voted as the Best Student Organization at Pitt.
Math Center at Pitt Bradford
Tutor
University of Pittsburgh at Bradford
Feb 2015 - April 2016
I tutored many different levels of students, from high schoolers taking Fundamentals of Math, through junior and senior students taking Calculus III and Advanced Differential Equations, as well as prepping with some graduating students for the GRE and other graduate exams.
EDUCATION
University of Pittsburgh
August 2016 - December 2018
My education covered all aspects of traditional Chemical Engineering, including Thermodynamics, Transport Phenomena, Reactor Design, Distillation, Control Engineering, and lots of process modeling, as well as peripheral courses (philosophy of science, studio arts, architecture, and product design classes).
University of Pittsburgh at Bradford
August 2014 - April 2016
I attended Pitt-Bradford for two years. While there, I did all my general engineering classes (calculus, chemistry, programming). Attending this branch campus gave me some incredible opportunities that I doubt I would've had or taken if I started at the main Pitt campus.
SKILLS
DIGITAL
Programming
- C, C++
- Python
- Igor Pro
- SCPI/ VISA
- Rust
- Amaranth HDL
Simulation
- SPICE (ngspice preferred) (FOSS)
- Qucs (RF) (FOSS)
- FreeCAD FEA / FEM (FOSS)
- COMSOL Multiphysics
- Familiarity with solid mechanics, diluted ion transport, and electrochemical modules for modeling novel devices
- MATLAB, Simulink
- Spartan, Avogadro
- Aspen
Design
- KiCAD (FOSS)
- Rigid, flex
- Multi-board systems
- High speed digital design, analog, mixed signal
- Design for test and manufacture
- Self-written CI/CD workflows to produce fabrication files and assembly documentation
- Altium Designer
- Rigid-flex
- KLayout (FOSS)
- Scriptable lithographic/IC design
- FreeCAD (FOSS)
- Designing for many different types of fabrication
- Experienced in creating and reviewing drawings
- Solidworks
- Siemens NX
- Blender (FOSS)
- Journal quality renders, 3D modeling, Python scripting
- Adobe Suite
- Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere
Computers and Hardware
- Comfortable with cross platform development
- Daily user of Linux, regular user of Windows/MacOS
- Proficient with with development on ARM Cortex
- Previous experience with AVR, RISC-V
- Experience in with hosting a wide variety of servers
- Self-hosted git, music, photos, file, overleaf servers
- Self-host an image processing application (tono) that I developed
- Experience with routers, switches, networking equipment
PHYSICAL
Test Equipment
- Realtime/sampling oscilloscopes
- Logic analyzers
- Spectrum and vector network analyzers
- Interferometry
- Home-grown specialty instruments on embedded platforms (microcontrollers, microprocessors, etc)
Nanofabrication Instrumentation
- Maskless alignment
- Photolithography and development
- Plasma asher/ reactive ion etch
- Wirebonder
- Cryostat, dunk tank, dilution fridges
- Electron beam evaporation
- Atomic layer deposition
- Sputtering
- Vacuum ovens and other vacuum processing equipment
Characterization Instrumentation
- Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM/SPM)
- Experience operating outside and inside of glovebox
- Experience with multitudes of operating modes:
- air and liquid imaging
- contact, tapping (AC)
- force pulls, force mapping/volumes
- conductive (C-AFM)
- piezo-force microscopy (PFM)
- variable field microscopy & magnetic field microscopy (VFM/MFM)
- high-frequency modulation (AMFM)
- kelvin-probe force microscopy (KPFM/ FKPM)
- contact resonance (CR)
- video-rate imaging (VRS)
- interferometric AFM via QPDI
- Probe Station
- Optical microscopy
- Scanning electron microscopy (SEM)
General Skills
- Comfortable working in cleanroom environments
- Glovebox & Chemical Hood (SACHE certifications)
- Power & Hand Workshop Tools
- 3D Printing (FDM, SLA, SLS)
- Screenprinting
- Sewing, knitting
RESEARCH
PIRE:HYBRID Conference on Materials for Quantum Computing
Fall 2018
A poster session hosted by PIRE:HYBRID, an international quantum computing partnership, as part of the 2018 Conference on Quantum Computing Materials.
Science 2018
Fall 2018
A poster session in conjunction with Pittsburgh Quantum Institute (PQI) and the Pittsburgh Science 2018 event.
PQI 2018
Spring 2018
I presented my work during the poster session portion of the PQI 2018 event, a 3 day research fair.
American Vacuum Society Meeting
Spring 2018
I presented my research at a symposium at Carnegie Mellon University, sponsored by AVS.
Omega Chi Epsilon Undergraduate Research Fair
Spring 2018
First Place
A research symposium for chemical engineering students at the Swanson School of Engineering. All students that research in the ChE department are required to present. I placed in first at this event.
Science 2017
Fall 2017
A poster session hosted by Pittsburgh Quantum Institute (PQI) as part of Pittsburgh's Science 2017 event.
Duquesne Undergraduate Research Program Symposium
Summer 2017
A poster session hosted by Duquesne University in Downtown Pittsburgh.
Blender Molecular Modeling
Summer 2017
I am currently working on implementing a script originally written by Patrick Fuller into a native Blender addon.
HOBBIES, PROJECTS, AND AWARDS
PCB design, fab, and assembly
After discovering KiCad, I got hooked on PCB design. I have designed and produced several dozen designs, ranging from small one-off breakouts through substantially large digital designs and contributions to open-source projects. I love spending my time thinking about how to make things that are not only useful for myself, but for those around me.
matei repair blog
Summer 2019
I like talking about my hobbies and what I'm working on. I was previously using this portfolio to show off some of that stuff, but it began to clutter the site. I want this site to be more professionally oriented, and more structured, and I think that putting my projects and ideas into a more casual space will work better. You can find this new site at blog.mateijordache.info, and it contains a bunch of migrated project documentation from here, as well as new projects, ideas, discussion, and work.
matei repair lab
Summer 2019
After many good experiences in fixing and teaching people about fixing, I decided to try and formalize my effort a bit more. matei repair lab is my shot at helping friends and the local community through the most direct way I can, fixing.
SNES cartridge reverse engineering
Spring 2019
The SNES has probably the best library of games from any early game system. After reading around on the NesDev forums, I became interested in learning more about how the SNES interacts with the cart, and trying to reverse engineer it to play a game that I could make or modify. Part of this project was inspired by Tom VII, who created a really interesting video on "reverse emulation" using SNES games on a NES. This was my first true digital design project and involved learning to work with the 6502 CPU.
IBM BlueHack Hackathon
Fall 2018
Third Place
This hackathon was the first IBM BlueHack in the US, and it was also the first at a university! Me, my roomates and a friend decided to make a team to participate. Our proposal was for an AI-powered recommendation engine framework that could be embedded into social messaging platforms, with a specific use case for vacation planning. Our idea, wAIfr, placed third at the event.
Bike mechanic
I routinely do work on my own bike, as well maintenance and repair on others (with no charge other than materials). I also try and hold workshops to teach other people about how their bikes work and how to properly maintain them. My current bike is built entirely from scratch parts, down to the ball-bearings. I typically bike anywhere I can get to within an hour.
The Who's "Tommy" Pinball Cabinet Restoration
Fall 2017
This was an old pinball machine received by WPTS. While still ongoing, we have made good progress towards a full restoration. Over several months, I diagnosed core issues, educated a team on how to diagnose and repair the issues, and was never quite able to set a high score.
HP 42s repair & restoration
Summer 2017
As a dedicated user of reverse polish notation (RPN), I've always had an interest in HP's flagship calculator, the 42s. With a going price of several hundred dollars, my best option was to buy a broken one and fix it up. I diagnosed the issue and was able to test my ideas using university electronics equipment. I was able to successfully revive the calculator in great condition.
Eurogames
Eurogames are a distinct subset of boardgames, specifically focusing on strategy and efficiency (as compared to luck or other random variables). Due to the small amount of random factors, they tend to play more like a puzzle that you compete with other players to solve in the most efficient manner. When I have time, I get together with friends and we hammer one out. Some of them can take upwards of 6 hours to finish!
ABOUT
CONTACT
I studied chemical engineering at the University of Pittsburgh. I currently work at Asylum Research, an AFM design and manufacturing business. It's a really unique place to work, and always exciting- we do research so that other people can do research. My research and career interests lie in electronic materials, instrumentation, and making things better. I love fixing things and am always interested in learning about how things work, new and old. I like to think that I can fix anything (may not be true).
Please feel free to reach out to me if you have any interesting projects or would like to learn more about me.