• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.6 no.5
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• pp.304-308
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• 1985

Morphological structure of tin oxide thin films was examined by transmission electron microscopy. TEM samples were prepared by chemical etching in hydrogen fluoride solution: firstly floating for 2-3 minutes in acid solution, then suspending on water found to be useful for the preparation of TEM samples. Electron micrographs showed the size of grains of the tin oxide crystal was dependent upon the temperature of the film preparation. Dopant concentration and heating time also influence the grain size. The resistivity of tin oxide material was explained by grain size and grain boundaries in a limited temperature and dopant concentration ranges.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.36-41
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• 2000

We studied the exchange anisotropy of Ni-Fe/Co-Fe/Mn-Ir/Cu/buffer/Si multilayers using D.C magnetron sputtering technique. Generally, Ni-Fe/Mn-Ir/buffer(Cu)/Si multilayers cannot pin the ferromagnetic layer for the lower exchange biased field. We got $H_{ex}$ ex/ increased by two times, after using Cu/Ta as buffer layer to get larger grain size of Mn-Ir layer and inserting very thin Co-Fe layer between the Ni-Fe layer and the Mn-Ir layer to get improved grain-to-grain epitaxy relation at the interface between Ni-Fe layer and Mn-Ir layer. The variation of $H_{ex}$ by thickness of Mn-Ir layer in ferromagnete/Mn-Ir/buffer/Si multilayers is different to that in Mn-Ir/ferromagnete/buffer/Si multilayers, because the volume distribution of grain size of Mn-Ir layer and the exchange energy at the interface between the Mn-Ir and the ferromagnetic layers is different for stacking sequence.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.49 no.4
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• pp.376-381
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• 2016

The effects of ICP (Inductively Coupled Plasma) power, ranging from 0 to 200 W, on the crystal structure, microstructure, surface roughness and mechanical properties of magnetron sputtered VN coatings were systematically investigated with FE-SEM, AFM, XRD and nanoindentation. The results show that ICP power has a significant influence on coating microstructure and mechanical properties of VN coatings. With the increasing of ICP power, coating microstructure evolves from a porous columnar structure to a highly dense one. Average crystal grain size of single phase cubic fcc VN coatings was decreased from 10.1 nm to 4.0 nm with increase of ICP power. The maximum hardness of 28.2 GPa was obtained for the coatings deposited at ICP power of 200 W. The smoothest surface morphology with Ra roughness of 1.7 nm was obtained from the VN coating sputtered at ICP power of 200 W.

• Korean Journal of Mineralogy and Petrology
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.213-220
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• 2023

In this study, we report the effect of starting materials on the grain size in a multi-component system at high pressure experiments. We used two different starting materials, glass and nano powders, to synthesize bridgmanite in the reduced conditions in the presence of calcium-ferrite-phase MgAl₂O₄ to compared the grain size of synthesized samples. After synthesizing the sample at 40 GPa, 2000 K for 20 hrs, the sample from glass showed the grain size of 50-200 nm whereas the one from nano powders has ~500 nm of grains. This difference may come from 1) the temperature of 2000 K which is low enough for glass starting materials to make more crystal nucleis than to grow crystal size or 2) the possible difference in the redox state of starting materials. It is suggested that the using of nano powders is better to synthesize bigger grains in high pressure experiments with multi-component systems rather than using glass starting materials.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.32 no.7
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• pp.326-331
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• 2022

AZ31 magnesium alloy was used to manufacture a thin plate using a melt drag method. The effects of roll speed, molten metal temperature, and molten metal height, which are the basic factors of the melt drag method, on the surface shape, the thickness of the thin plate, Vickers hardness, and microstructure of the thin plate were investigated. It was possible to manufacture AZ31 magnesium alloy thin plate at the roll speed range of 1 to 90 m/min. The thickness of the thin plate, manufactured while changing only the roll speed, was about 1.8 to 8.8 mm. The shape of the solidified roll surface was affected by two conditions, the roll speed and the molten metal height, and the Vickers hardness of the manufactured magnesium alloy thin plate value ranged from Hv38~Hv60. The microstructure of the thin plate produced by this process was an equiaxed crystal and showed a uniform grain size distribution. The grain size was greatly affected by the contact state between the molten metal and the solidification roll, and the amount of reactive solids and liquids scraped at the same time as the thin plate. The average grain size of the thin plate fabricated in the range of these experimental conditions changed to about 50-300 ㎛.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.154-155
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• 2012

The promise of nano-crystalites (nc) as a technological material, for applications including display backplane, and solar cells, may ultimately depend on tailoring their behavior through doping and crystallinity. Impurities can strongly modify electronic and optical properties of bulk and nc semiconductors. Highly doped dopant also effect structural properties (both grain size, crystal fraction) of nc-Si thin film. As discussed in several literatures, P atoms or radicals have the tendency to reside on the surface of nc. The P-radical segregation on the nano-grain surfaces that called self-purification may reduce the possibility of new nucleation because of the five-coordination of P. In addition, the P doping levels of ${\sim}2{\times}10^{21}\;at/cm^3$ is the solubility limitation of P in Si; the solubility of nc thin film should be smaller. Therefore, the non-activated P tends to segregate on the grain boundaries and the surface of nc. These mechanisms could prevent new nucleation on the existing grain surface. Therefore, most researches shown that highly doped nc-thin film by using conventional PECVD deposition system tended to have low crystallinity, where the formation energy of nucleation should be higher than the nc surface in the intrinsic materials. If the deposition technology that can make highly doped and simultaneously highly crystallized nc at low temperature, it can lead processes of next generation flexible devices. Recently, we are developing a novel CVD technology with a neutral particle beam (NPB) source, named as neutral beam assisted CVD (NBaCVD), which controls the energy of incident neutral particles in the range of 1~300eV in order to enhance the atomic activation and crystalline of thin films at low temperatures. During the formation of the nc-/pm-Si thin films by the NBaCVD with various process conditions, NPB energy directly controlled by the reflector bias and effectively increased crystal fraction (~80%) by uniformly distributed nc grains with 3~10 nm size. In the case of phosphorous doped Si thin films, the doping efficiency also increased as increasing the reflector bias (i.e. increasing NPB energy). At 330V of reflector bias, activation energy of the doped nc-Si thin film reduced as low as 0.001 eV. This means dopants are fully occupied as substitutional site, even though the Si thin film has nano-sized grain structure. And activated dopant concentration is recorded as high as up to 1020 #/$cm^3$ at very low process temperature (＜ $80^{\circ}C$) process without any post annealing. Theoretical solubility for the higher dopant concentration in Si thin film for order of 1020 #/$cm^3$ can be done only high temperature process or post annealing over $650^{\circ}C$. In general, as decreasing the grain size, the dopant binding energy increases as ratio of 1 of diameter of grain and the dopant hardly be activated. The highly doped nc-Si thin film by low-temperature NBaCVD process had smaller average grain size under 10 nm (measured by GIWAXS, GISAXS and TEM analysis), but achieved very higher activation of phosphorous dopant; NB energy sufficiently transports its energy to doping and crystallization even though without supplying additional thermal energy. TEM image shows that incubation layer does not formed between nc-Si film and SiO2 under later and highly crystallized nc-Si film is constructed with uniformly distributed nano-grains in polymorphous tissues. The nucleation should be start at the first layer on the SiO2 later, but it hardly growth to be cone-shaped micro-size grains. The nc-grain evenly embedded pm-Si thin film can be formatted by competition of the nucleation and the crystal growing, which depend on the NPB energies. In the evaluation of the light soaking degradation of photoconductivity, while conventional intrinsic and n-type doped a-Si thin films appeared typical degradation of photoconductivity, all of the nc-Si thin films processed by the NBaCVD show only a few % of degradation of it. From FTIR and RAMAN spectra, the energetic hydrogen NB atoms passivate nano-grain boundaries during the NBaCVD process because of the high diffusivity and chemical potential of hydrogen atoms.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.136-142
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• 2022

The crystal structure, grain growth behavior, and dielectric properties of BaTiO₃ have been studied with the addition of Dy₂O₃. The powders were synthesized at ratios of (100-x)BaTiO₃-xDy₂O₃ (mol%, x = 0, 0.5, 1.0, 2.0) by a conventional solid-state synthesis, and the powder compacts were sintered at 1250℃ for 2 hours in air. As the amount of added Dy₂O₃ was increased, the crystal structure of the sintered samples changed from a tetragonal to a pseudo-cubic structure, and the tetragonality decreased. In addition, a secondary phase of Ba₁₂Dy_4.67Ti₈O₃₅ appeared when Dy₂O₃ was added. The average grain size after sintering decreased and abnormal grains appeared as the amount of Dy₂O₃ increased. It can be explained that the grain growth behavior of the Dy₂O₃ added-BaTiO₃ occurs due to the two-dimensional nucleation and growth, and is governed by the interface reaction. Further, the correlation between crystal structure, microstructure, and dielectric properties was discussed.

• Macromolecular Research
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.189-194
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• 2004

When water is evaporated quickly from a water-based colloidal suspension, colloidal particles protrude from the water surface, distorting it and generating lateral capillary forces between the colloidal particles. The protruded colloidal particles are then assembled into ordered colloidal crystalline domains that float on the water surface on account of their having a lower effective density than water. These colloidal crystal domains then assemble together by lateral capillary force and convective flow; the generated colloidal crystal has grain boundaries. The single domain size of the colloidal crystal could be controlled, to some extent, by changing the rate of water evaporation, but it seems very difficult to fabricate a single crystal over a large area of the water's surface without reorienting each colloidal crystal domain. To reorient such colloidal crystal domains, a glass plate was dipped into the colloidal suspension at a tilted angle because the meniscus (airwaterglass plate interface) is pinned and thinned by further water evaporation. The thinning meniscus generated a shear force and reoriented the colloidal crystalline domains into a single domain.

• Interaction and multiscale mechanics
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.15-30
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• 2009

The theoretical framework of the interaction fields for multiple scales based on field theory is applied to one-dimensional problem mimicking dislocation substructure sensitive intra-granular inhomogeneity evolution under fatigue of Cu-added steels. Three distinct scale levels corresponding respectively to the orders of (A)dislocation substructures, (B)grain size and (C)grain aggregates are set-up based on FE-RKPM (reproducing kernel particle method) based interpolated strain distribution to obtain the incompatibility term in the interaction field. Comparisons between analytical conditions with and without the interaction, and that among different cell size in the scale A are simulated. The effect of interaction field on the B-scale field evolution is extensively examined. Finer and larger fluctuation is demonstrated to be obtained by taking account of the field interactions. Finer cell size exhibits larger field fluctuation whereas the coarse cell size yields negligible interaction effects.

• Information Display
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.25-30
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• 2004

Poly-Si TFT(Thin Film Transistor) technology are reviewed and discussed. Poly-Si TFTs fabricated on glass using low-temperature process were studied extensively for the application to LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) as well as to OLED(Organic Light Emitting Diode) Display. Currently, one of the application targets of the poly-Si TFT is emphasized on the highly functional SOG(System on Glass). Improvement of device characteristics such as an enhancement of carrier mobility has been studied intensively by enlarging the grain size. Reduction of the voltage and shrinkage of the device size are the trend of AM FPD(Active Matrix Flat Panel Display) as well as of Si LSI, which will arise a peculiar issue of uniformity for the device performance. Some approaches such as nucleation control of the grain seed or lateral grain growth have been tried, so far.