• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.52-52
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• 2011

A novel deposition process for n-type nanocrystalline silicon (n-type nc-Si) thin films at room temperature has been developed by adopting the neutral beam assisted chemical vapor deposition (NBa-CVD). During formation of n-type nc-Si thin film by the NBa-CVD process with silicon reflector electrode at room temperature, the energetic particles could induce enhance doping efficiency and crystalline phase in polymorphous-Si thin films without additional heating on substrate; The dark conductivity and substrate temperature of P-doped polymorphous~nano crystalline silicon thin films increased with increasing the reflector bias. The NB energy heating substrate(but lower than $80^{\circ}C$ and increase doping efficiency. This low temperature processed doped nano-crystalline can address key problem in applications from flexible display backplane thin film transistor to flexible solar cell.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.254-255
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• 2012

Interest in nano-crystalline silicon (nc-Si) thin films has been growing because of their favorable processing conditions for certain electronic devices. In particular, there has been an increase in the use of nc-Si thin films in photovoltaics for large solar cell panels and in thin film transistors for large flat panel displays. One of the most important material properties for these device applications is the macroscopic charge-carrier mobility. Hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) or nc-Si is a basic material in thin film transistors (TFTs). However, a-Si:H based devices have low carrier mobility and bias instability due to their metastable properties. The large number of trap sites and incomplete hydrogen passivation of a-Si:H film produce limited carrier transport. The basic electrical properties, including the carrier mobility and stability, of nc-Si TFTs might be superior to those of a-Si:H thin film. However, typical nc-Si thin films tend to have mobilities similar to a-Si films, although changes in the processing conditions can enhance the mobility. In polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) thin films, the performance of the devices is strongly influenced by the boundaries between neighboring crystalline grains. These grain boundaries limit the conductance of macroscopic regions comprised of multiple grains. In much of the work on poly-Si thin films, it was shown that the performance of TFTs was largely determined by the number and location of the grain boundaries within the channel. Hence, efforts were made to reduce the total number of grain boundaries by increasing the average grain size. However, even a small number of grain boundaries can significantly reduce the macroscopic charge carrier mobility. The nano-crystalline or polymorphous-Si development for TFT and solar cells have been employed to compensate for disadvantage inherent to a-Si and micro-crystalline silicon (${\mu}$-Si). Recently, a novel process for deposition of nano-crystralline silicon (nc-Si) thin films at room temperature was developed using neutral beam assisted chemical vapor deposition (NBaCVD) with a neutral particle beam (NPB) source, which controls the energy of incident neutral particles in the range of 1~300 eV in order to enhance the atomic activation and crystalline of thin films at room temperature. In previous our experiments, we verified favorable properties of nc-Si thin films for certain electronic devices. During the formation of the nc-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. The more resent work on nc-Si thin film transistors (TFT) was done. We identified the performance of nc-Si TFT active channeal layers. The dependence of the performance of nc-Si TFT on the primary process parameters is explored. Raman, FT-IR and transmission electron microscope (TEM) were used to study the microstructures and the crystalline volume fraction of nc-Si films. The electric properties were investigated on Cr/SiO2/nc-Si metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitors.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.12-17
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• 2019

In this study, the Ag nano-dots structure and silicon nitride film were applied to the textured wafer surface to improve the light trapping effect of mono-crystalline silicon solar cell. Ag nano-dots structure was formed by performing a heat treatment for 30 minutes at 650℃ after the deposition of 10nm Ag thin film. Ag thin film deposition was performed using a thermal evaporator. The silicon nitride film was deposited by a Hot-wire chemical vapor deposition. The effect of light trapping was compared and analyzed through light reflectance measurements. Experimental results showed that the reflectivity increased by 0.5 ~ 1% under all nitride thickness conditions when Ag nano-dots structure was formed before nitride film deposition. In addition, when the Ag nano-dots structure is formed after deposition of the silicon nitride film, the reflectance is increased in the nitride film condition of 70 nm or more. When the HF treatment was performed for 60 seconds to improve the Ag nano-dot structure, the overall reflectance was improved, and the reflectance was 0.15% lower than that of the silicon nitride film-only sample at 90 nm silicon nitride film condition.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.30-35
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• 2013

In order to increase cell efficiency in crystalline silicon solar cell, reduction of light reflection is one of the essential problem. Until now silicon wafer was textured by wet etching process which has random patterns along crystal orientation. In this study, high aspect ratio patterns are manufactured by nano imprint process and reflectance could be minimized under 1%. After that, screen printed solar cell was fabricated on the textured wafer and I-V characteristics was measured by solar simulator. Consequently cell efficiency of solar cell fabricated using the wafer textured by nano imprint process increased 1.15% than reference solar cell textured by wet etching. Internal quantum efficiency was increased in the range of IR wave length but decreased in the UV wavelength. In spite of improved result, optimization between nano imprinted pattern and solar cell process should be followed.

• KIEE International Transactions on Electrophysics and Applications
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• v.2C no.5
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• pp.258-261
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• 2002

Electrical forming dependent current-voltage (I-V) and numerically derived differential conductance(dI／dV) characteristics have been presented in the multi-layer nano-crystalline silicon／oxygen (no-Si／O) superlattice. Distinct staircase-like features, indicating the presence of resonant tunnel barriers, are clearly observed in the dc I-V characteristics. Also, all samples showed a continuous change in current and zero conductivity around OV corresponding to the Coulomb blockade in the calculated dI／dV-V curve. Also, Ra-man scattering measurement showed the presence of a nano-crystalline Si structure. This result becomes a step in the right direction for the fabrication of silicon-based optoelectronic and quantum devices as well as for the replacement of silicon-on-insulator (SOI) in high speed and low power silicon MOSFET devices of the future.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 1998.02a
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• pp.68-69
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• 1998

Nano-crystalline silicon(nc-Si) thin films were directly depposited by ion beam assisted electron beam depposition (IBAED) method. The visibe luminescence in IBAED sampples were originated from not an oxygen bond but Si nano-crystallites. And we can conclude that the ion beam would be contribute to the suppression of the Si-O bond formation.

• Journal of Information Display
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.109-112
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• 2010

The solid phase compositions and dielectric properties of silicon nitride ($SiN_x$) films prepared using the plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) technique at a low temperature ($200^{\circ}C$) were studied. Controlling the source gas mixing ratio, R = $[N_2]/[SiH_4]$, and the plasma power successfully produced both silicon-rich and nitrogen-rich compositions in the final films. The composition parameter, X, varied from 0.83 to 1.62. Depending on the film composition, the dielectric properties of the $SiN_x$ films also varied substantially. Silicon-rich silicon nitride (SRSN) films were obtained at a low plasma power and a low R. The photoluminescence (PL) spectra of these films revealed the existence of nano-sized silicon particles even in the absence of a post-annealing process. Nitrogen-rich silicon nitride (NRSN) films were obtained at a high plasma power and a high R. These films showed a fairly high dielectric constant ($\kappa$ = 7.1) and a suppressed hysteresis window in their capacitance-voltage (C-V) characteristics.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.1-11
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• 2018

Current major photovoltaic (PV) market share (> 60%) is being occupied by the multicrystalline (mc)-silicon solar cells despite of low efficiency compared to single crystalline silicon solar cells. The diamond wire sawing technology reduces the production cost of crystalline silicon solar cells, it increases the optical loss for the existing mc-silicon solar cells and hence its efficiency is low in the current mass production line. To overcome the optical loss in the mc-crystalline silicon, caused by the diamond wire sawing, next generation texturing process is being investigated by various research groups for the PV industry. In this review, the limitation of surface structure and optical loss due to the reflectivity of conventional mc-silicon solar cells are explained by the typical texturing mechanism. Various texturing technologies that could minimize the optical loss of mc-silicon solar cells are explained. Finally, next generation texturing technology to survive in the fierce cost competition of photovoltaic market is discussed.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.114-117
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• 2023

Transparent Photovoltaic (PV) modules have recently been in the spotlight because they can be applied to buildings and vehicles. However, crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar modules, which account for about 90% of the PV module market, have the disadvantage of applying transparent PV modules due to their unique opacity. Recently, a see-through type PV module using a crystalline silicon solar strap has been developed. However, there is a problem due to a decrease in aesthetics due to the metal ribbon in the center of the see-through type PV module and difficulty bonding the metal ribbon due to the low voltage output of the strap. In this study, to solve this problem, we developed a fabrication process of series connected c-Si solar strap cells using the c-Si solar cells. We succeeded in fabricating a series connected strap with a width of 2-10 mm, and we plan to manufacture an aesthetic see-through type c-Si PV module.

• Proceedings of the IEEK Conference
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• 2003.07b
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• pp.727-730
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• 2003

Thin tin oxide film with nano-size particle was prepared on silicon substrate by hydrothermal synthetic method and successive sol-gel spin coating method. The fabrication method of tin oxide film with ultrafine nano-size crystalline structure was tried to be applied to fabrication of micro gas sensor array on silicon substrate. The tin oxide film on silicon substrate was well patterned by chemical etching upto 5${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$width and showed very uniform flatness. The tin oxide film preparation method and patterning method were successfully applied to newly proposed 2-dimensional micro sensor fabrication.