• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.14 no.10
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• pp.785-791
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• 2001

High dielectric (Ba, Sr) TiO$_3$ thin films were etched in an inductively coupled plasma (ICP) as a function of Cl$_2$/Ar mixing ration. Under Cl$_2$(20)/Ar(80), the maximum etch rate of the BST films was 400 $\AA$/mim and selectivities of BST to Pt and PR were obtained 0.4 and 0.2, respectively. Etching products were redeposited on the surface of BST and resulted in varying the nature of crystallinity. Therefore, we investigated the etched surface of BST by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) atomic force microscopy (AFM) and x-ray diffraction (XRD). From the result of XPS analysis, we found that residues of Ba-Cl and Ti-Cl bonds remained on the surface of the etched BST for high boiling point. The morphology of the etched surfact was analyzed by AFM. A smoothsurface(roughness ~2.8nm) ws observed under Cl$_2$(20)/Ar(80), rf power of 600 W, dc bias voltage of -250 V and pressure of 10 mTorr. This changed the nature of the crystallinity of BST. From the result of XRD analysis, the crystallinities of the etched BST film under Ar only and Cl$_2$(20)/Ar(80) were maintained as similar to as-deposited BST. However, intensity of BST(100) orientation under Cl$_2$ only plasma was abruptly decreased. This indicated that CI compounds were redeposited on the etched BST surface and resulted in changed of the crystallinity of BST during the etch process.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.167-167
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• 2011

Magnetic random access memory (MRAM) is one of the prospective semiconductor memories for next generation. It has the excellent features including nonvolatility, fast access time, unlimited read/write endurance, low operating voltage, and high storage density. MRAM consists of magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) stack and complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS). The MTJ stack is composed of various magnetic materials, metals, and a tunneling barrier layer. For the successful realization of high density MRAM, the etching process of magnetic materials should be developed. Among various magnetic materials, FePt has been used for pinned layer of MTJ stack. The previous etch study of FePt magnetic thin films was carried out using $CH_4/O_2/NH_3$. It reported only the etch characteristics with respect to the variation of RF bias powers. In this study, the etch characteristics of FePt thin films have been investigated using an inductively coupled plasma reactive ion etcher in various etch chemistries containing $CH_4$/Ar and $CH_4/O_2/Ar$ gas mixes. TiN thin film was employed as a hard mask. FePt thin films are etched by varying the gas concentration. The etch characteristics have been investigated in terms of etch rate, etch selectivity and etch profile. Furthermore, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy is applied to elucidate the etch mechanism of FePt thin films in $CH_4$/Ar and $CH_4/O_2/Ar$ chemistries.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.25 no.11
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• pp.622-629
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• 2015

Cu circuits were successfully fabricated on flexible PET(polyethylene terephthalate) substrates using wettability difference and electroless plating without an etching process. The wettability of Cu plating solution on PET was controlled by oxygen plasma treatment and $SiO_x$-DLC(silicon oxide containing diamond like carbon) coating by HMDSO(hexamethyldisiloxane) plasma. With an increase of the height of the nanostructures on the PET surface with the oxygen plasma treatment time, the wettability difference between the hydrophilicity and hydrophobicity increased, which allowed the etchless formation of a Cu pattern with high peel strength by selective Cu plating. When the height of the nanostructure was more than 1400 nm (60 min oxygen plasma treatment), the reduction of the critical impalement pressure with the decreasing density of the nanostructure caused the precipitation of copper in the hydrophobic region.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2007.07a
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• pp.1333-1334
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• 2007

Al thin film was the most popular electrode in semiconductor and flat panel display world, because of its electrical conductivity, selectivity and easy to apply to thin film. However, Al thin films were not good to use on the bottom electrode about the crystalline growth of inorganic compound materials such as ZnO, AlN and GaN, because of its surface roughness and melting points. In this paper, we investigated Ar plasma surface treatment of Al thin film to enhance the surface roughness and electrical conductivity using the reactive ion etching system. Several process conditions such as RF power, working pressure and process time were controlled. In results, the surface roughness showed $15.53\;{\AA}$ when RF power was 100 W, working pressure was 50 mTorr and process time was 10 min. Also, we tried to deposit ZnO thin films on the each Al thin films, the upper conditions showed the best crystalline characteristics by x-ray diffraction.

• ETRI Journal
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.675-684
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• 2016

This paper demonstrates the effect of fluoride-based plasma treatment on the performance of $Al_2O_3/AlGaN/GaN$ metal-insulator-semiconductor heterostructure field effect transistors (MISHFETs) with a T-shaped gate length of $0.20{\mu}m$. For the fabrication of the MISHFET, an $Al_2O_3$ layer as a gate dielectric was deposited using atomic layer deposition, which greatly decreases the gate leakage current, followed by the deposition of the silicon nitride layer. The silicon nitride layer on the gate foot region was then selectively removed through a reactive ion etching technique using $CF_4$ plasma. The etching process was continued for a longer period of time even after the complete removal of the silicon nitride layer to expose the $Al_2O_3$ gate dielectric layer to the plasma environment. The thickness of the $Al_2O_3$ gate dielectric layer was slowly reduced during the plasma exposure. Through this plasma treatment, the device exhibited a threshold voltage shift of 3.1 V in the positive direction, an increase of 50 mS/mm in trans conductance, a degraded off-state performance and a larger gate leakage current compared with that of the reference device without a plasma treatment.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.223-223
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• 2012

Surface engineering plays a significant role in fabricating highly functionalized materials applicable to industrial and biomedical fields. Surface wrinkles and folds formed by ion beam or plasma treatment are buckling-induced patterns and controlled formation of those patterns has recently gained considerable attention as a way of creating well-defined surface topographies for a wide range of applications. Surface wrinkles and folds can be observed when a stiff thin layer attached to a compliant substrate undergoes compression and plasma treatment is one of the techniques that can form stiff thin layers on compliant polymeric substrates, such as poly (dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS). Here, we report two effective methods using plasma modification techniques for controlling the formation of surface wrinkles and folds on flat or patterned PDMS substrates. First, we show a method of creating wrinkled diamond-like carbon (DLC) film on grooved PDMS substrates. Grooved PDMS substrates fabricated by a molding method using a grooved master prepared by photolithography and a dry etching process were treated with argon plasma and subsequently coated with DLC film, which resulted in the formation of wrinkled DLC film aligning perpendicular to the steps of the pre-patterned ridges. The wavelength and the amplitude of the wrinkled DLC film exhibited variation in the submicron- to micron-scale range according to the duration of argon plasma pre-treatment. Second, we present a method for controlled formation of folds on flat PDMS substrates treated with oxygen plasma under large compressive strains. Flat PDMS substrates were strained uniaxially and then treated with oxygen plasma, resulting in the formation of surface wrinkles at smaller strain levels, which evolved into surface folds at larger strain levels. Our results demonstrate that we can control the formation and evolution of surface folds simply by controlling the pre-strain applied to the substrates and/or the duration of oxygen plasma treatment.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.190-198
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• 2010

Asymmetric model for plasma uniformity by Ar and $CF_4$ was modeled by the antenna structure, the diameter of chamber, and the distance between source and substrate for the development of plasma equipment for 450 mm wafer. The aspect ratio of chamber was divided by diameter, distance from substrate, and pumping port area. And we found the condition with the optimized plasma uniformity by changing the antenna structure. The drift diffusion and quasi-neutrality for simplification were used, and the ion energy function was activated for the surface recombination and etching reaction. The uniformity of plasma density on substrate surface was improved by being far of the distance between substrate wall and chamber wall, and substrate and plasma source. And when the antenna of only 2 turns was used, the plasma uniformity can improve from 20~30% to 4.7%.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Surface Engineering Conference
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• 2009.05a
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• pp.247-247
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• 2009

3차원 반도체 패키징에서 관통전극 Through Silicon Via (TSV)를 형성하기 위하여 이온과 래디컬의 활성도 조절이 가능한 pulsating inductively coupled plasma (ICP) 식각을 수행하였다. 본 식각공정에서는 펄스주파수 ($50{\sim}500Hz$)와 듀티 싸이클 ($20{\sim}99%$)을 조절하여, 플라즈마 내 이온과 래디컬들의 활성도 변화를 발생시켰다. 플라즈마 공정변수에 따라 식각형태가 달라짐을 S.E.M을 이용하여 확인했으며, 이온(SFx+, O+)과 래디컬 ($SF^*$, $F^*$, $O^*$)의 농도 및 활성도 변화를 측정하기 위하여 광학적 기술인 optical emissin spectroscopy와 전기적 특성 측정 기술인 Langmuir probe 시스템을 직접 제작 설치하여 펄스플라즈마를 진단하였다.

• 한국정보디스플레이학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2005.07a
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• pp.768-773
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• 2005

We present an overview of our new method of liquid crystal (LC) alignment based on the anisotropic etching of the alignment layers with a directed plasma flux. The method is realized by the use of anode layer source of "race track" geometry generating two "sheets" of accelerated plasma. These sheets are directed obliquely to the treated substrates. The static and dynamic irradiation regimes have been explored. The optimized processing conditions and materials are discussed. The technique yields an excellent uniformity of liquid crystal alignment of planar, tilted and vertical types. It is shown that the new method can be easily adapted for the alignment treatment of large area substrates used in the modern LCD manufacturing process.

• Journal of Surface Science and Engineering
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.126-130
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• 2015

A high-pressure depletion method using plasma chemical vapor deposition (CVD) is often used to deposit hydrogenated microcrystalline silicon (${\mu}c-Si:H$) films of a low defect density at a high deposition rate. To understand proper deposition conditions of ${\mu}c-Si:H$ films for a high-pressure depletion method, Si films were deposited in a combinatorial way using a multi-hollow discharge plasma CVD method. In this paper the substrate temperature dependence of ${\mu}c-Si:H$ film properties are demonstrated. The higher substrate temperature brings about the higher deposition rate, and the process window of device quality ${\mu}c-Si:H$ films becomes wider until $200^{\circ}C$. This is attributed to competitive reactions between Si etching by H atoms and Si deposition.