Space Business Podcast #117 - Jessica Frick, Stanford XLab, In-Space Manufacturing of Advanced Materials

In-space manufacturing is what we are discussing in this episode, and we have a really cool and qualified guest: Jessica Frick is a researcher at Stanford’s XLab, the extreme environment microsystems lab. They recently held a workshop on semiconductor manufacturing in microgravity, just published a white paper about it (linked below), and are now setting up an institute focused on manufacturing advanced materials in microgravity. Enjoy! The Institute for In-Space Manufacturing of Advanced Materials https://rb.gy/b4661j White paper: Semiconductor Manufacturing in Low-Earth Orbit for Terrestrial Use https://osf.io/preprints/osf/d6ar4 Follow us: Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/podcast_space LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/raphaelroettgen/ Instagram -  www.instagram.com/raphael_space/ Learn more about space & the space economy: SPACE ECONOMY BOOK: Raphael's fully revised introductory book on the Space economy, "To Infinity" - https://a.co/d/6jIQ2LO Check out the edX/EPFL Space Economy MOOC: https://www.edx.org/course/new-space-economy Upcoming newsletter - sign up: https://spacebusiness.substack.com/ The Space Business Podcast is sponsored by NanoAvionics. Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 2:20 Intro to XLab & Jessica 4:37 Jessica's origin story & motivation 8:54 Semiconductor manufacturing primer 14:15 In-space manufacturing for Earth 15:58 Which part of semi manufacturing makes sense to do in space 17:30 Advantages of microgravity  18:50 Could it be done on Earth? 20:25 Advantages of microgravity (cont'd) 26:20 Semiconductor materials besides silicon 28:50 Why larger crystals are better 35:45 Why now? 38:45 Safety & astronaut intervention 40:30 Microgravity platforms besides the ISS 41:40 Importance of subject matter expertise 45:00 Origin of the idea for the new institute 54:55 Current ISS equipment 55:55 The Institute for In-Space Manufacturing of Advanced Materials 1:02:00 How to get involved 1:04:25 Sci-fi