• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.207-207
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• 2011

Amorphous transparent oxide semiconductors (a-TOS) have been widely studied for many optoelectronic devices such as AM-OLED (active-matrix organic light emitting diodes). Recently, Nomura et al. demonstrated high performance amorphous IGZO (In-Ga-Zn-O) TFTs.1 Despite the amorphous structure, due to the conduction band minimum (CBM) that made of spherically extended s-orbitals of the constituent metals, an a-IGZO TFT shows high mobility.2,3 But IGZO films contain high cost rare metals. Therefore, we need to investigate the alternatives. Because Aluminum has a high bond enthalpy with oxygen atom and Alumina has a high lattice energy, we try to replace Gallium with Aluminum that is high reserve low cost material. In this study, we focused on the electrical properties of IZO:Al thin films as a channel layer of TFTs. IZO:Al were deposited on unheated non-alkali glass substrates (5 cm ${\times}$ 5 cm) by magnetron co-sputtering system with two cathodes equipped with IZO target and Al target, respectively. The sintered ceramic IZO disc (3 inch ${\phi}$, 5 mm t) and metal Al target (3 inch ${\phi}$, 5 mm t) are used for deposition. The O2 gas was used as the reactive gas to control carrier concentration and mobility. Deposition was carried out under various sputtering conditions to investigate the effect of sputtering process on the characteristics of IZO:Al thin films. Correlation between sputtering factors and electronic properties of the film will be discussed in detail.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2015.08a
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• pp.160-160
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• 2015

InGaZnO (IGZO) thin-film transistors (TFTs) are very promising due to their potential use in high performance display backplane [1]. However, the stability of IGZO TFTs under the various stresses has been issued for the practical IGZO applications [2]. Up to now, many researchers have studied to understand the sub-gap density of states (DOS) as the root cause of instability [3]. Nomura et al. reported that these deep defects are located in the surface layer of the IGZO channel [4]. Also, Kim et al. reported that the interfacial traps can be affected by different RF-power during RF magnetron sputtering process [5]. It is well known that these trap states can influence on the performances and stabilities of IGZO TFTs. Nevertheless, it has not been reported how these defect states are created during conventional RF magnetron sputtering. In general, during conventional RF magnetron sputtering process, negative oxygen ions (NOI) can be generated by electron attachment in oxygen atom near target surface and accelerated up to few hundreds eV by self-bias of RF magnetron sputter; the high energy bombardment of NOIs generates bulk defects in oxide thin films [6-10] and can change the defect states of IGZO thin film. In this study, we have confirmed that the NOIs accelerated by the self-bias were one of the dominant causes of instability in IGZO TFTs when the channel layer was deposited by conventional RF magnetron sputtering system. Finally, we will introduce our novel technology named as Magnetic Field Shielded Sputtering (MFSS) process [9-10] to eliminate the NOI bombardment effects and present how much to be improved the instability of IGZO TFTs by this new deposition method.

• 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.

• 한국정보디스플레이학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.1097-1100
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• 2008

We demonstrate that the performance of amorphous indium-gallium-zinc-oxide (IGZO) thin-film transistors (TFT) can be optimized by controlling the interfaces between IGZO and sandwiching insulators and by proper deposition of IGZO layer. Specifically, contact and channel resistances are decreased by reducing IGZO bulk resistance and optimizing dry-etch process, respectively. Field-effect mobility ($\mu_{FE}$) and subthreshold gate swing (S) are further enhanced by fine-tuning IGZO deposition condition.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.249-254
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• 2015

Solution-derived amorphous indium-gallium-zinc oxide (a-IGZO) thin-film-transistor (TFTs) were developed using a microwave irradiation treatment at low process temperature below $300^{\circ}C$. Compared to conventional furnace-annealing, the a-IGZO TFTs annealed by microwave irradiation exhibited better electrical characteristics in terms of field effect mobility, SS, and on/off current ratio, although the annealing temperature of microwave irradiation is much lower than that of furnace annealing. The microwave irradiated TFTs showed a smaller $V_{th}$ shift under the positive gate bias stress (PGBS) and negative gate bias stress (NGBS) tests owing to a lower ratio of oxygen vacancies, surface absorbed oxygen molecules, and reduced interface trapping in a-IGZO. Therefore, microwave irradiation is very promising to low-temperature process.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2010.08a
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• pp.169-169
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• 2010

As display industry requires various applications for future display technology, which can guarantees high level of flexibility and transparency on display panel, oxide semiconductor materials are regarded as one of the best candidates. $InGaZnO_4$(IGZO) has gathered much attention as a post-transition metal oxide used in active layer in thin-film transistor. Due to its high mobility fabricated at low temperature fabrication process, which is proper for application to display backplanes and use in flexible and/or transparent electronics. Electrical performance of amorphous oxide semiconductors depends on the resistance of the interface between source/drain metal contact and active layer. It is also affected by sheet resistance on IGZO thin film. Controlling contact/sheet resistance has been a hot issue for improving electrical properties of AOS(Amorphous oxide semiconductor). To overcome this problem, post-annealing has been introduced. In other words, through post-annealing process, saturation mobility, on/off ratio, drain current of the device all increase. In this research, we studied on the relation between device's resistance and post-annealing temperature. So far as many post-annealing effects have been reported, this research especially analyzed the change of electrical properties by increasing post-annealing temperature. We fabricated 6 main samples. After a-IGZO deposition, Samples were post-annealed in 5 different temperatures; as-deposited, $100^{\circ}C$, $200^{\circ}C$, $300^{\circ}C$, $400^{\circ}C$ and $500^{\circ}C$. Metal deposition was done on these samples by using Mo through E-beam evaporation. For analysis, three analysis methods were used; IV-characteristics by probe station, surface roughness by AFM, metal oxidation by FE-SEM. Experimental results say that contact resistance increased because of the metal oxidation on metal contact and rough surface of a-IGZO layer. we can suggest some of the possible solutions to overcome resistance effect for the improvement of TFT electrical performances.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.519-525
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• 2015

Positive bias stress-induced instability in amorphous indium-gallium-zinc-oxide (a-IGZO) bottom-gate thin-film transistors (TFTs) was investigated under high $V_{GS}$/low $V_{DS}$ and low $V_{GS}$/high $V_{DS}$ stress conditions through incorporating a forward/reverse $V_{GS}$ sweep and a low/high $V_{DS}$ read-out conditions. Our results showed that the electron trapping into the gate insulator dominantly occurs when high $V_{GS}$/low $V_{DS}$ stress is applied. On the other hand, when low $V_{GS}$/high $V_{DS}$ stress is applied, it was found that holes are uniformly trapped into the etch stopper and electrons are locally trapped into the gate insulator simultaneously. During a recovery after the high $V_{GS}$/low $V_{DS}$ stress, the trapped electrons were detrapped from the gate insulator. In the case of recovery after the low $V_{GS}$/high $V_{DS}$ stress, it was observed that the electrons in the gate insulator diffuse to a direction toward the source electrode and the holes were detrapped to out of the etch stopper. Also, we found that the potential profile in the a-IGZO bottom-gate TFT becomes complicatedly modulated during the positive $V_{GS}/V_{DS}$ stress and the recovery causing various threshold voltages and subthreshold swings under various read-out conditions, and this modulation needs to be fully considered in the design of oxide TFT-based active matrix organic light emitting diode display backplane.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.239-244
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• 2017

We experimentally investigate the physical mechanism for asymmetrical degradation in amorphous indium-gallium-zinc oxide (a-IGZO) thin-film transistors (TFTs) under simultaneous gate and drain bias stresses. The transfer curves exhibit an asymmetrical negative shift after the application of gate-to-source ($V_{GS}$) and drain-to-source ($V_{DS}$) bias stresses of ($V_{GS}=24V$, $V_{DS}=15.9V$) and ($V_{GS}=22V$, $V_{DS}=20V$), but the asymmetrical degradation is more significant after the bias stress ($V_{GS}$, $V_{DS}$) of (22 V, 20 V) nevertheless the vertical electric field at the source is higher under the bias stress ($V_{GS}$, $V_{DS}$) of (24 V, 15.9 V) than (22 V, 20 V). By using the modified external load resistance method, we extract the source contact resistance ($R_S$) and the voltage drop at $R_S$ ($V_{S,\;drop}$) in the fabricated a-IGZO TFT under both bias stresses. A significantly higher RS and $V_{S,\;drop}$ are extracted under the bias stress ($V_{GS}$, $V_{DS}$) of (22 V, 20V) than (24 V, 15.9 V), which implies that the high horizontal electric field across the source contact due to the large voltage drop at the reverse biased Schottky junction is the dominant physical mechanism causing the asymmetrical degradation of a-IGZO TFTs under simultaneous gate and drain bias stresses.