• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.48 no.7
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• pp.660-666
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• 2010

30 nm thick Ni layers were deposited on a glass substrate by e-beam evaporation. Subsequently, 30 nm or 60 nm ${\alpha}-Si:H$ layers were grown at low temperatures ($<220^{\circ}C$) on the 30 nm Ni/Glass substrate by catalytic CVD (chemical vapor deposition). The sheet resistance, phase, microstructure, depth profile and surface roughness of the $\alpha-Si:H$ layers were examined using a four-point probe, HRXRD (high resolution Xray diffraction), Raman Spectroscopy, FE-SEM (field emission-scanning electron microscopy), TEM (transmission electron microscope) and AES depth profiler. The Ni layers reacted with Si to form NiSi layers with a low sheet resistance of $10{\Omega}/{\Box}$. The crystallinty of the $\alpha-Si:H$ layers on NiSi was up to 60% according to Raman spectroscopy. These results show that both nano-scale NiSi layers and crystalline Si layers can be formed simultaneously on a Ni deposited glass substrate using the proposed low temperature catalytic CVD process.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.196-205
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• 2019

Surface modification techniques are known to improve SCC by adding large compressive residual stresses to metal surfaces. This surface modification technology is attracting attention because it is an economical and practical technology compared to the maintenance method of existing nuclear power plants. Surface modification techniques include laser, water jet and ultrasonic peening, pinning and ultrasonic Nano-crystal surface modification (UNSM). The focus of this study was on the effect of ultrasonic amplitude in UNSM treatment on the corrosion properties of Alloy 600. A microstructure analysis was conducted using an optical microscope (OM), scanning electron microscope (SEM) and electron backscattering diffraction (EBSD). A cyclic polarization test and AC-impedance measurement were both used to analyze the corrosion properties. UNSM treatment influences the corrosion resistance of Alloy 600 depending on its amplitude. Below the critical amplitude value, the pitting corrosion properties are improved by grain refinement and compressive residual stress, but above the critical amplitude value, crevices are formed by the formation of overlapped waves. These crevices act as corrosion initiators, reducing pitting corrosion resistance.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.46 no.11
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• pp.755-761
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• 2008

We fabricated thermally evaporated 10 nm-Ni/1 nm-Ir/(poly)Si films to investigate the energy saving property of silicides formed by rapid thermal annealing (RTA) at the temperature range of $300{\sim}1200^{\circ}C$ for 40 seconds. Moreover, we fabricated 100 nm-thick ITO/(poly)Si films with an rf-sputter as references. A transmission electron microscope (TEM) and an X-ray diffractometer were used to determine cross-sectional microstructure and phase changes. A UV-VIS-NIR and FT-IR (Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy) were employed for near-IR and middle-IR absorbance. Through TEM analysis, we confirmed 20~65 nm-thick silicide layers formed on the single and polycrystalline silicon substrates. Ir-inserted nickel silicide on single crystalline substrate showed almost the same absorbance in near IR region as well as ITO, but Ir-inserted nickel silicide on polycrystalline substrate, which had the uniform absorbance in specific region, showed better absorbance in near IR region than ITO. The Ir-inserted nickel silicide on polycrystalline substrate particularly showed better absorbance in middle IR region than ITO. The results imply that nano-thick Ir-inserted nickel silicides may have excellent absorbing capacity in near-IR and middle-IR region.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.251-252
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• 2012

Recently, the growing interest in organic microelectronic devices including OLEDs has led to an increasing amount of research into their many potential applications in the area of flexible electronic devices based on plastic substrates. However, these organic devices require a gas barrier coating to prevent the permeation of water and oxygen because organic materials are highly susceptible to water and oxygen. In particular, high efficiency OLEDs require an extremely low Water Vapor Transition Rate (WVTR) of $1{\times}10^{-6}g/m^2$/day. The Key factor in high quality inorganic gas barrier formation for achieving the very low WVTR required ($1{\times}10^{-6}g/m^2$/day) is the suppression of defect sites and gas diffusion pathways between grain boundaries. In this study, we developed an $Al_2O_3$ nano-crystal structure single gas barrier layer using a Neutral Beam Assisted Sputtering (NBAS) process. The NBAS system is based on the conventional RF magnetron sputtering and neutral beam source. The neutral beam source consists of an electron cyclotron Resonance (ECR) plasma source and metal reflector. The Ar+ ions in the ECR plasma are accelerated in the plasma sheath between the plasma and reflector, which are then neutralized by Auger neutralization. The neutral beam energies were possible to estimate indirectly through previous experiments and binary collision model. The accelerating potential is the sum of the plasma potential and reflector bias. In previous experiments, while adjusting the reflector bias, changes in the plasma density and the plasma potential were not observed. The neutral beam energy is controlled by the metal reflector bias. The NBAS process can continuously change crystalline structures from an amorphous phase to nano-crystal phase of various grain sizes within a single inorganic thin film. These NBAS process effects can lead to the formation of a nano-crystal structure barrier layer which effectively limits gas diffusion through the pathways between grain boundaries. Our results verify the nano-crystal structure of the NBAS processed $Al_2O_3$ single gas barrier layer through dielectric constant measurement, break down field measurement, and TEM analysis. Finally, the WVTR of $Al_2O_3$ nano-crystal structure single gas barrier layer was measured to be under $5{\times}10^{-6}g/m^2$/day therefore we can confirm that NBAS processed $Al_2O_3$ nano-crystal structure single gas barrier layer is suitable for OLED application.

• 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 Ceramic Society
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• v.50 no.6
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• pp.510-517
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• 2013

In this study, the properties of blue inorganic nano-pigments with a spinel structure were systematically investigated. We report the preparation of a blue ceramic nano-pigment and the Co and Ni substitutional effects on the blue color. $MgAl_2O_4$ was selected as the crystalline host network for the synthesis of cobalt and nickel-based blue ceramic nano-pigments. Various compositions of $Co_xMg_{1-x}Al_2O_4$ and $Ni_xMg_{1-x}Al_2O_4$ ($0{\leq}x{\leq}1$) powders were prepared using apolymerized complex method. The obtained powder was preheated at $400^{\circ}C$ for 5 h and then calcined at $1000^{\circ}C$ for 5 h. XRD patterns of the (Co,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ and (Ni,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ samples showed a single phase of the spinel structure in all compositions. TEM results indicated nano-sized pigments for (Co,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ and (Ni,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ with a particle size ranging from 20 to 50 nm. The characteristics of the color tones of (Co,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ and (Ni,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ were analyzed by CIE $L^*a^*b^*$ measurements. In addition, the thermal stability and the binding characteristics of (Co,Mg)$Al_2O_4$, (Ni,Mg)$Al_2O_4$ are discussed in terms of the TG-DSC and FT-IR results, respectively.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.297-301
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• 2004

Nano-sized mullite (3Al$_2$O$_3$$.$2SiO$_2$) colloids were prepared by use of the spray combustion method. For combustion reaction, Al(NO$_3$)$_3$$.$9$H_2O$, and CH$_{6}$N$_4$O were used as an oxidizer and a fuel respectively, and then colloidal silica was also added as 2SiO$_2$source for mullite. The temperature of the reaction chamber was kept at 80$0^{\circ}C$ to initiate the ignition of droplets of the mixed precursors. For preventing droplet coagulation, the droplet number concentration was reduced using the metal screen filter, and the residence time of aerosol was kept at 2.5 seconds for laminar flow. The synthesized colloidal particles had an uniform spherical shape with 130 nanometer size and the crystalline phase showed the mullite with stoichiometry in the observations of XRD and TEM.

• Journal of Power System Engineering
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.110-115
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• 2013

The electrochemical performance and microstructure of Al-Si, Al-Si/C was investigated as anode for lithium ion battery. The Al-Si nano composite with 5 : 1 at% ratio was prepared by arc-discharge nano powder process. However, some of problem is occurred, when Al nano composite was synthesized by this manufacturing. The oxidation film is generated around Al-Si particles for passivating processing in the manufacture. The oxidation film interrupts electrical chemistry reaction during lithium ion insertion/extraction for charge and discharge. Because of the existence the oxidation film, Al-Si first cycle capacity is very lower than other examples. Therefore, carbon synthsized by glucose ($C_6H_{12}O_6$) was conducted to remove the oxidation film covered on the composite. The results showed that the first discharge cycle capacity of Al-Si/C is improved to 113mAh/g comparing with Al-Si (18.6mAh/g). Furthermore, XRD data and TEM images indicate that $Al_4C_3$ crystalline exist in Al-Si/C composite. In addition the Si-Al anode material, in which silicon is more contained was tested by same method as above, it was investigated to check the anode capacity and morphology properties in accordance with changing content of silicon, Si-Al anode has much higher initial discharge capacity(about 500mAh/g) than anode materials based on Aluminum as well as the morphology properties is also very different with the anode based Aluminum.

• Proceedings of the IEEK Conference
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• 2001.10a
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• pp.315-324
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• 2001

Mechanochemical effects that occurred in the fine grinding process of quartz particles using planetary ball mill was investigated. Quartz particles have been frequently utilized for optical materials, semiconductor molding materials. We determined that grinding for a long time can be create amorphous structures from the crystalline quartz by Mechanochemical effects. But, to be produced nano-composite particles that the critical grinding time reached for composite materials in a short time. Henceforth, a qualitative estimation must be conducted on the filler for EMC(Epoxy molding compound) materials. It can be produced mechanochemically treated composite materials and also an integrated grinding efficiency considering of the nano-composite amorphous structured particles. The mechanochemical characteristics were evaluated based on particle morphology, size distribution, specific surface area, density and the amount of amorphous phase materials into the particle surface. The grinding operation in the planetary ball mill can be classified into three stages. During the first stage, initial particle size was reduced for the increase of specific surface area. In the second stage, the specific surface areas increased in spite of the increase in particle size. The final stage as a critical grinding stage, the ground quartz was considered mechanochemically treated particles as a nano- composite amorphous structured particles. The development of amorphous phase on the particle surface was evaluated by X-ray diffractometry, thermal gravity analysis and IR spectrometer. The amount of amorphous phase of particles ground for 2048 minutes was 85.3% and 88.2% by X-ray analysis and thermal gravity analysis, respectively.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.249-252
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• 2012

Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles were prepared under high temperature and pressure conditions by mixture of metal nitrate solution and $TiO_2$ sol. Fe doped $TiO_2$ particles were reacted in the temperature range of 170 to $200^{\circ}C$ for 6 h. The microstructure and phase of the synthesized Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles were studied by SEM (FE-SEM), TEM, and XRD. Thermal properties of the synthesized Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles were studied by TG-DTA analysis. TEM and X-ray diffraction pattern shows that the synthesized Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles were crystalline. The average size and distribution of the synthesized Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles were about 10 nm and narrow, respectively. The average size of the synthesized Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles increased as the reaction temperature increased. The overall reduction in weight of Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles was about 16% up to ${\sim}700^{\circ}C$; water of crystallization was dehydrated at $271^{\circ}C$. The transition of Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticle phase from anatase to rutile occurred at almost $561^{\circ}C$. The amount of rutile phase of the synthesized Fe doped $TiO_2$ nanoparticles increased with decreasing Fe concentration. The effects of synthesis parameters, such as the concentration of the starting solution and the reaction temperature, are discussed.