• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.49 no.2
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• pp.152-158
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• 2016

We investigated the effect of capacitively coupled Ar plasma treatment on contact resistance ($R_c$) and channel sheet resistance ($R_{sh}$) of graphene field effect transistors (FETs), by varying their channel length in the wide range from 200 nm to $50{\mu}m$ which formed the transfer length method (TLM) patterns. When the Ar plasma treatment was performed on the long channel ($10{\sim}50{\mu}m$) graphene FETs for 20 s, $R_c$ decreased from 2.4 to $1.15k{\Omega}{\cdot}{\mu}m$. It is understood that this improvement in $R_c$ is attributed to the formation of $sp^3$ bonds and dangling bonds by the plasma. However, when the channel length of the FETs decreased down to 200 nm, the drain current ($I_d$) decreased upon the plasma treatment because of the significant increase of channel $R_{sh}$ which was attributed to the atomic structural disorder induced by the plasma across the transfer length at the edge of the channel region. This study suggests a practical guideline to reduce $R_c$ using various plasma treatments for the $R_c$ sensitive graphene and other 2D material devices, where $R_c$ is traded off with $R_{sh}$.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2012.05a
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• pp.67.1-67.1
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• 2012

Graphene has attracted much attention for future nanoelectronics due to its superior electrical properties. Owing to its extremely high carrier mobility and controllable carrier density, graphene is a promising material for practical applications, particularly as a channel layer of high-speed FET. Furthermore, the planar form of graphene is compatible with the conventional top-down CMOS fabrication processes and large-scale synthesis by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process is also feasible. Despite these promising characteristics of graphene, much work must still be done in order to successfully develop graphene FET. One of the key issues is the process technique for gate dielectric formation because the channel mobility of graphene FET is drastically affected by the gate dielectric interface quality. Formation of high quality gate dielectric on graphene is still a challenging. Dirac voltage, the charge neutral point of the device, also strongly depends on gate dielectrics. Another performance killer in graphene FET is source/drain contact resistance, as the contact resistant between metal and graphene S/D is usually one order of magnitude higher than that between metal and silicon S/D. In this presentation, the key issues on graphene-based FET, including organic-inorganic hybrid gate dielectric formation, controlling of Dirac voltage, reduction of source/drain contact resistance, device structure optimization, graphene gate electrode for improvement of gate dielectric reliability, and CVD graphene transfer process issues are addressed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.618-618
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• 2013

Graphene is only one atom thick planar sheet of sp2-bonded carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb crystal lattice, which has flexible and transparent characteristics with extremely high mobility. These noteworthy properties of graphene have given various applicable opportunities as electrode and/or channel for various flexible devices via suitable physical and chemical modifications. In this work, for the development of all-graphene devices, we performed to synthesize alternately patterned structure of mono- and multi-layer graphene by using the patterned Ni film on Cu foil, having much different carbon solid solubilities. Depending on the process temperature, Ni film thickness, introducing occasion of methane and gas ratio of CH4/H2, the thickness and width of the multi-layer graphene were considerably changed, while the formation of monolayer graphene on just Cu foil was not seriously influenced. Based on the alternately patterned structure of mono- and multi-layer graphene as a channel and electrode, respectively, the flexible TFT (thin film transistor) on SiO2/Si substrate was fabricated by simple transfer and O2 plasma etching process, and the I-V characteristics were measured. As comparing the change of resistance for bending radius and the stability for a various number of repeated bending, we could confirm that multi-layer graphene electrode is better than Au/Ti electrode for flexible applications.

• Transactions of the Society of Information Storage Systems
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.56-60
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• 2012

Graphene oxide, which is exfoliated by oxidant from graphite, is the material for solving the problem of mass production and positioning. We made graphene oxide based devices by dielectrophoresis, studied and controlled factors which can affect the characteristic of graphene oxide channel. Graphene oxide channel assembled by dielectrophoresis can be constructed differently by various frequency options. We confirmed the change of gate characteristics and I-V characteristics in the range from 80K to 300K temperature.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2014.02a
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• pp.229.2-229.2
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• 2014

Graphene, an allotrope of carbon, is a two-dimensional material having a unique electro-mechanical property that shows significant change of the electrical conductance under the applied strain. In addition of the extraordinary mechanical strength [1], graphene becomes a prospective candidate for pressure sensor technology [2]. However, very few investigations have been carried out to demonstrate characteristics of graphene sensor as a device form. In this study, we demonstrate a pressure sensor using graphene double layer as an active channel to generate electrical signal as the response of the applied vertical pressure. For formation of the active channel in the pressure sensor, two single graphene layers which are grown on Cu foil (25 um thickness) by the plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) are sequentially transformed to the poly-di-methyl-siloxane (PDMS) substrate. Dry and wet transfer methods are individually employed for formation of the double layer graphene. This sensor geometry results a switching characteristic which shows ~900% conductivity change in response to the application of pulsed pressure of 5 kPa whose on and off duration is 3 sec. Additionally, the functional reliability of the sensor confirms consistent behavior with a 200-cycle test.

• Carbon letters
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.162-170
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• 2013

The performance of graphene-based electronic devices is critically affected by the quality of the graphene-metal contact. The understanding of graphene-metal is therefore critical for the successful development of graphene-based electronic devices, especially field-effect-transistors. Here, we provide a review of the peculiar properties of graphene-metal contacts, including work function pinning, the charge transport mechanism, the impact of the process on the contract resistance, and other factors.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.230-230
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• 2012

Graphene have showed promising performance as electrodes of organic devices such as organic transistors, light-emitting diodes, and photovoltaic solar cells. In particular, among various organic materials of graphene-based organic devices, pentacene has been regarded as one of the promising organic material because of its high mobility, chemical stability. In the bottom-contact device configuration generally used as graphene based pentacene devices, the morphology of the organic semiconductors at the interface between a channel and electrode is crucial to efficient charge transport from the electrode to the channel. For the high quality morphology, understanding of initial stages of pentacene growth is essential. In this study, we investigate self-assembly of pentacene molecules on graphene formed on a 6H-SiC (0001) substrate by scanning tunneling microscopy. At sub-monolayer coverage, adsorption of pentacene molecules on epitaxial graphene is affected by $6{\times}6$ pattern originates from the underlying buffer layer. And the orientation of pentacene in the ordered structure is aligned with the zigzag direction of the edge structure of single layer graphene. As coverage increased, intermolecular interactions become stronger than molecule-substrate interaction. As a result, herringbone structures the consequence of higher intermolecular interaction are observed.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.140-144
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• 2014

The contact mechanism of devices is usually researched at electrode contacts. However, the contact between a dielectric and channel at the MOS structure is more important. The graphene was used as a channel material, and the thin film transistor with MOS structure was prepared to observe the contact mechanism. The graphene was obtained on Cu foil by the thermal decomposition method with $H_2$ and $CH_4$ mixed gases at an ambient annealing temperature of $1000^{\circ}C$ during the deposition for 30 min, and was then transferred onto a $SiO_2/Si$ substrate. The graphene was doped in a nitrogen acidic solution. The chemical properties of graphene were investigated to research the effect of nitric atoms doping. The sheet resistance of graphene decreased after nitrogen acidic doping, and the sheet resistance decreased with an increase in the doping times because of the increment of negative charge carriers. The nitric-atom-doped graphene showed the Ohmic contact at the curve of the drain current and drain voltage, in spite of the Schottky contact of grapnene without doping.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.204-208
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• 2018

Monolayer graphene grown via chemical vapor deposition (CVD) is recognized as a promising material for sensor applications owing to its extremely large surface-to-volume ratio and outstanding electrical properties, as well as the fact that it can be easily transferred onto arbitrary substrates on a large-scale. However, the Dirac voltage of CVD-graphene devices fabricated with transferred graphene layers typically exhibit positive shifts arising from transfer and photolithography residues on the graphene surface. Furthermore, the Dirac voltage is dependent on the channel lengths because of the effect of metal-graphene contacts. Thus, large and nonuniform Dirac voltage of the transferred graphene is a critical issue in the fabrication of graphene-based sensor devices. In this work, we propose a fabrication process for graphene field-effect transistors with Dirac voltages close to zero. A vacuum annealing process at $300^{\circ}C$ was performed to eliminate the positive shift and channel-length-dependence of the Dirac voltage. In addition, the annealing process improved the carrier mobility of electrons and holes significantly by removing the residues on the graphene layer and reducing the effect of metal-graphene contacts. Uniform and close to zero Dirac voltage is crucial for the uniformity and low-power/voltage operation for sensor applications. Thus, the current study is expected to contribute significantly to the development of graphene-based practical sensor devices.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2014.02a
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• pp.434.2-434.2
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• 2014

We observe enhanced pH response of solution-gated field-effect transistors (SG-FET) having 1D-2D hybrid channel of vertical grown ZnO nanorods grown on CVD graphene (Gr). In recent years, SG-FET based on Gr has received a lot of attention for biochemical sensing applications, because Gr has outstanding properties such as high sensitivity, low detection limit, label-free electrical detection, and so on. However, low-defect CVD Gr has hardly pH responsive due to lack of hydroxyl group on Gr surface. On the other hand, ZnO, consists of stable wurtzite structure, has attracted much interest due to its unique properties and wide range of applications in optoelectronics, biosensors, medical sciences, etc. Especially, ZnO were easily grown as vertical nanorods by hydrothermal method and ZnO nanostructures have higher sensitivity to environments than planar structures due to plentiful hydroxyl group on their surface. We prepared for ZnO nanorods vertically grown on CVD Gr (ZnO nanorods/Gr hybrid channel) and to fabricate SG-FET subsequently. We have analyzed hybrid channel FETs showing transfer characteristics similar to that of pristine Gr FETs and charge neutrality point (CNP) shifts along proton concentration in solution, which can determine pH level of solution. Hybrid channel SG-FET sensors led to increase in pH sensitivity up to 500%, compared to pristine Gr SG-FET sensors. We confirmed plentiful hydroxyl groups on ZnO nanorod surface interact with protons in solution, which causes shifts of CNP. The morphology and electrical characteristics of hybrid channel SG-FET were characterized by FE-SEM and semiconductor parameter analyzer, respectively. Sensitivity and sensing mechanism of ZnO nanorods/Gr hybrid channel FET will be discussed in detail.