Abstract: A dicing apparatus for cutting a semiconductor wafer into a plurality of a microelectronic circuit dice each having bonding pads which are located adjacent a cutting path on the wafer. The apparatus comprises a diamond dicing blade which is held between a pair of flanges, fitted to a spindle rotating at very high speed, the blade cutting the wafer along the cutting path in an up-cut and down-cut mode. Cooling wafer is applied from both sides of the rotating flanges and dicing blade, from a coolant nozzle and flows against a cutting interface. Each flange has an outer side surface such that, as the flange rotates, the major quantity of the cooling water flows along the outer side surface and violently flows onto a surface of the wafer which is beyond the edge of the bonding pad, to avoid the cutting debris from being driven into the bonding pad, when the dicing blade works in the down-cut mode.

Abstract: A process for the production of sphingomyelinase comprising cultivating a sphingomyelinase-producing microorganism, belonging to the genus Pseudomonas, in a culture medium and recovering sphingomyelinase from the culture medium.