Modular, device-scale, direct-chip-attach packaging formicrosystems

A pressing challenge to the commercial implementation of prototype microsystems is the reduction of package size and cost. To decrease package size, a process was developed for the fabrication of high-aspect-ratio, through-wafer interconnect structures. These interconnects permit device-scale packaging of microsystems and are compatible with modern surface mount technology such as flip chip assembly. To minimize package cost, a modular wafer-level silicon packaging architecture was devised. Low temperature bonding methods were used to join package components, permitting integration of driving circuitry on the microsystem die. The reconfigurable architecture allows standard package components to serve a wide variety of applications     

Working conditions in home care: negotiating race and class boundaries in gendered work

Home care work in metropolitan areas is a source of employment for immigrant women of color. Service work of this type intertwines domestic and caring labor in ways that reinforce the historically gendered and racialized nature of the work. Such macro level economic and political issues are played out at the micro level of daily service provided within elderly clients' homes. A study of these processes in home care work was carried out in urban southern Ontario in two nonprofit home care agencies. In-depth interviews and focus groups held with visible minority home care workers suggested that workers deal daily with racist attitudes and behaviors from clients and their families; agencies recognize these oppressive processes but usually handle them on a case-by-case basis through supervisors; and home care workers handle racism on the job as they do in their off-work hours-by avoidance, situating incidents within an analysis of the circumstances of elderly clients, setting boundaries on discussions, and occasionally, confrontation.