• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.49-53
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• 2018

Since various methods to form well-aligned nano-/micro- patterns are underlying technologies to fabricate next generation wearable electronic devices, many efforts have been made to realize finer patterns in recent years. Among lots of patterning methods, the present invention includes a nano-transfer printing (n-TP) process which is advantageous in that a processing cost is low and high-resolution patterns can be formed within a short processing time. We successfully achieved pattern formation of highly ordered Pt lines with line-width of 250 nm, 500 nm, and $1{\mu}m$ on transparent and flexible substrates. In addition, we analyzed the durability of the patterns, showing excellent stability of line-shape even after a physical and repeated bending test of 500 times using a bending machine. As a result, it is expected that a n-TP process is very useful for forming various metal patterns, and it is also expected to be applied to wiring and interconnection technology of next generation flexible electronic devices.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.105-111
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• 2023

Electronic devices have been evolved to be mechanically flexible that can be endured repetitive deformation. This evolution emphasizes the importance of long-term reliability in metal wiring connecting electronic components, especially under bending fatigue in compressed environments. This study investigated methods to enhance adhesion between copper (Cu) and polyimide (PI) substrates, aiming to improve the reliability of copper wiring under such conditions. We applied oxygen plasma treatment and introduced a chromium (Cr) adhesion layer to the polyimide substrate. Our findings revealed that these adhesion enhancement methods significantly affect compression fatigue behavior. Notably, the chromium adhesion layer, while showing weaker fatigue characteristics at 1.5% strain, demonstrated superior performance at 2.0% strain with no delamination, outperforming other methods. These results offer valuable insights for improving the reliability of flexible electronic devices, including reducing crack occurrence and enhancing fatigue resistance in their typical usage environments.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.63-67
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• 2016

In this paper, we present an indirect method of elastic modulus measurement for various lamination layers formed on polymer-based compliant substrates. Although the elastic modulus of every component is crucial for mechanically reliable microelectronic devices, it is difficult to accurately measure the film properties because the lamination layers are hardly detached from the substrate. In order to resolve the problem, 3-point bending test is conducted with a film-substrate specimen and area transformation rule is applied to the cross-sectional area of the film region. With known substrate modulus, a modulus ratio between the film and the substrate is calculated using bending stiffness of the multilayered specimen obtained from the 3-point bending test. This method is verified using electroplated copper specimens with two types of film-substrate structure; double-sided film and single sided film. Also, common dielectric layers, prepreg (PPG) and dry film solder resist (DF SR), are measured with the double-sided specimen type. The results of copper (110.3 GPa), PPG (22.3 GPa), DF SR (5.0 GPa) were measured with high precision.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.434-434
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• 2012

Despite recent efforts for fabricating flexible transparent conducting films (TCFs) with low resistance and high transmittance, several obstacles to meet the requirement of flexible displays still remain. Indium tin oxide (ITO) thin films, which have been traditionally used as the TCFs, have a serious obstacle in TCFs applications. SWNTs are the most appropriate materials for conductive films for displays due to their excellent high mechanical strength and electrical conductivity. Recently, it has been demonstrated that acid treatment is an efficient method for surfactant removal. However, the treatment has been reported to destroy most SWNT. In this work, the fabrication by the spraying process of transparent SWNT films and reduction of its sheet resistance by Au-ionic doping treatment on PET substrates is researched. Arc-discharge SWNTs were dispersed in deionized water by adding sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) as surfactant and sonicated, followed by the centrifugation. The dispersed SWNT was spray-coated on PET substrate and dried on a hotplate. When the spray process was terminated, the TCF was immersed into deionized water to remove the surfactant and then it was dried on hotplate. The TCF film was then was doped with Au-ionic doping treatment, rinsed with deionized water and dried. The surface morphology of TCF was characterized by field emission scanning electron microscopy. The sheet resistance and optical transmission properties of the TCF were measured with a four-point probe method and a UV-visible spectrometry, respectively. This was confirmed and discussed on the XPS and UPS studies. We show that 87 ${\Omega}/{\Box}$ sheet resistances with 81% transmittance at the wavelength of 550 nm. The changes in electrical and optical conductivity of SWNT film before and after Au-ionic doping treatments were discussed. The effects of hole transport interface layer using Au-ionic doping SWNT on the performance of organic solar cells were investigated.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.5-5
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• 2009

Thin-film-transistors (TFTs) that can be prepared at low temperatures have attracted much attention because of the great potential for transparent and flexible electronics. One of the mainstreams in this field is the use of organic semiconductors such as pentacene. But device performance of the organic TFTs is still limited due to low field-effect mobility and rapid degradation after exposing to air. Alternative approach is the use of amorphous oxide semiconductors as a channel. Amorphous oxide semiconductors (AOSs) based TFTs showed the fast technological development, because AOS films can be fabricated at room temperature and exhibit the possibility in application like flexible display, electronic paper, and larges solar cells. Among the various AOSs, a-IGZO has lots of advantages because it has high channel mobility, uniform surface roughness and good transparency. [1] The high mobility is attributed to the overlap of spherical s-orbital of the heavy post-transition metal cations. This study demonstrated the effect of the variation in channel thickness from 30nm to 200nm on the TFT device performance. When the thickness was increased, turn-on voltage and subthreshold swing was decreased. The a-IGZO channels and source/drain metals were deposited with shadow mask. The a-IGZO channel layer was deposited on $SiO_2$/p-Si substrates by RF magnetron sputtering, where RF power is 150W. And working pressure is 3m Torr, at $O_2/Ar$ (2/28 sccm) atmosphere. The electrodes were formed with electron-beam evaporated Ti (30 nm) and Au (70 nm) bilayer. Finally, Al (150nm) as a gate metal was thermal-evaporated. TFT devices were heat-treated in a furnace at 250 $^{\circ}C$ and nitrogen atmosphere for 1hour. The electrical properties of the TFTs were measured using a probe-station. The TFT with channel thickness of 150nm exhibits a good subthreshold swing (SS) of 0.72 V/decade and on-off ratio of $1{\times}10^8$. The field effect mobility and threshold voltage were evaluated as 7.2 and 8 V, respectively.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2011.05a
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• pp.104.1-104.1
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• 2011

가볍고, 유연성(flexibility)을 갖는 박막(thin film)형 플랙서블 태양전지(flexible solar cell)는 상황에 따른 형태의 변형이 가능하여, 휴대가 간편하고, 기존 혹은 신규 구조물의 지붕(rooftop)등에 설치가 용이하여, 차세대 성장 동력 분야에서 각광받고 있다. 그러나 아직까지 플랙서블 태양전지는 제작시 열에 의한 기판의 변형, 기판 이송시 너울 현상, 대면적 패터닝(patterning) 기술 등 많은 어려움 등으로 웨이퍼나 글라스 기판에 제조된 태양전지 대비 낮은 광전환 효율을 갖는다. 따라서 본 연구에서는 플랙서플 태양전지 성능개선을 위해 3.5세대급 ($450{\times}450cm^2$) 스퍼터(sputter), 금속유기 화학기상장치 (MOCVD), 플라즈마 화학기상장치 (PECVD), 레이저 가공장치 (Laser scriber)를 이용하여 a-Si:H/a-SiGe:H 이중접합(tandem)을 갖는 태양전지를 제작하였고, 광 변환효율 특성을 평가하였다. 전도도(conductivity), 라만(Raman)분광 및 UV/Visible 분광 분석을 통하여 박막의 전기적, 구조적, 광학적 물성을 평가하여 단위박막의 물성을 최적화 했다. 또한 제작된 태양전지는 쏠라 시뮬레이터 (Solar Simulator)를 이용하여 성능 평가를 수행하였고, 상/하부층의 전류 정합 (current matching)을 위해 외부양자효율 (external quantum efficiency) 분석을 수행하였다. 제작된 이중접합 접이식 태양전지로 소면적($0.25cm^2$)에서 8.7%, 대면적($360cm^2$ 이상) 8.0% 이상의 효율을 확보하였으며, 성능 개선을 위해 대면적 패턴 기술 향상 및 공정 기술 개선을 수행 중이다.

• Science of Emotion and Sensibility
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.391-402
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• 2010

In this study, breathable waterproof materials were prepared by electrospinning. Five kinds of electrospun nanofiber web layered systems with different levels of nanofiber web density, as well as different substrates and layer structures were fabricated, and their mechanical properties (tensile, bending, shear, compression, surface, and thickness & weight) were measured by the KES-FB system and compared with those of conventional breathable waterproof fabrics (densely woven fabric, PTFE laminated fabric and PU coated fabric). The KES-FB measurements demonstrate that the lab-scale nanofiber web layered systems are more flexible and fuller than commercial nanofiber web layered systems, which have a more compact structure than the lab-scale nanofiber web layered systems. Densely woven fabrics and lab-scale nanofiber web layered systems showed lower values of tensile linearity (LT), bending stiffness (B), and shear stiffness (G) than those of PU coated and PTFE laminated fabric. These results indicate that they are more flexible and have less resistance to the shearing movement, corresponding to a more pliable material having a better drape, than PU coated fabrics and PTFE laminated fabrics.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.37 no.6
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• pp.577-582
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• 2013

AZO (aluminum-doped zinc oxide) is one of the best candidate materials to replace ITO (indium tin oxide) for TCOs (transparent conductive oxides) used in flat panel displays, organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), and organic solar cells (OSCs). In the present study, to apply an AZO thin film to the transparent electrode of an organic solar cell, a low-temperature selective atomic layer deposition (ALD) process was adopted to deposit an AZO thin film on a flexible poly-ethylene-naphthalate (PEN) substrate. The reactive gases for the ALD process were di-ethyl-zinc (DEZ) and tri-methyl-aluminum (TMA) as precursors and H2O as an oxidant. The structural, electrical, and optical characteristics of the AZO thin film were evaluated. From the measured results of the electrical and optical characteristics of the AZO thin films deposited on the PEN substrates by ALD, it was shown that the AZO thin film appeared to be comparable to a commercially used ITO thin film, which confirmed the feasibility of AZO as a TCO for flexible organic solar cells in the near future.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.21 no.10
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• pp.573-579
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• 2011

Highly textured Ag, Al and Al:Si back reflectors for flexible n-i-p silicon thin-film solar cells were prepared on 100-${\mu}m$-thick stainless steel substrates by DC magnetron sputtering and the influence of their surface textures on the light-scattering properties were investigated. The surface texture of the metal back reflectors was influenced by the increased grain size and by the bimodal distribution that arose due to the abnormal grain growth at elevated deposition temperatures. This can be explained by the structure zone model (SZM). With an increase in the deposition temperatures from room temperature to $500^{\circ}C$, the surface roughness of the Al:Si films increased from 11 nm to 95 nm, whereas that of the pure Ag films increased from 6 nm to 47 nm at the same deposition temperature. Although Al:Si back reflectors with larger surface feature dimensions than pure Ag can be fabricated at lower deposition temperatures due to the lower melting point and the Si impurity drag effect, they show poor total and diffuse reflectance, resulting from the low reflectivity and reflection loss on the textured surface. For a further improvement of the light-trapping efficiency in solar cells, a new type of back reflector consisting of Ag/Al:Si bilayer is suggested. The surface morphology and reflectance of this reflector are closely dependent on the Al:Si bottom layer and the Ag top layer. The relationship between the surface topography and the light-scattering properties of the bilayer back reflectors is also reported in this paper.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.205-211
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• 2012

We investigated the optical and hydrophobic properties of the deposited silver (Ag) zinc oxide (ZnO) nanorods (NRs) on flexible indium tin oxide (ITO) coated polyethylene terephthalate (PET) substrates (i.e., ITO/PET). The ZnO NRs were grown by an electrochemical deposition using a sputtered ZnO seed layer and the Ag was deposited by using a thermal evaporator. For comparison, the same fabrication process was carried out on the bare ITO/PET without ZnO NRAs. Due to the discrete surface of ZnO NRs, the deposited Ag was formed as nano-scale particles, while the Ag became film-like for bare ITO/PET. In order to control the size and amount of Ag particles, the Ag deposition time was changed from 100 to 600 s. When the deposition time was increased, the Ag particles became larger and denser, and the absorptance was increased. This enhanced absorptance may be due to the localized surface plasmon resonance of Ag particles. Furthermore, the relatively high hydrophobicity was observed for the deposited Ag on the ZnO NRs/ITO/PET. These improved optical and surface properties are expected to be useful for flexible photovoltaic and optoelectronic devices.