• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.24-28
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• 2007

The etching of zinc oxide (ZnO) thin films has been studied using a high density plasma in a $Cl_2/Ar$ gas. The etch characteristics of ZnO thin films were systematically investigated on varying $Cl_2$ concentration, coil rf power, dc-bias voltage, and gas pressure. With increasing $Cl_2$ concentration, the etch rate of ZnO thin film increased, the redeposition around the etched patterns decreased but the sidewall slope of the etched patterns slanted. As the coil rf power and dc-bias voltage increased, the etch rates of ZnO thin films increased and etch profiles of ZnO thin films were improved. With increasing gas pressure, the etch rate of ZnO thin films slightly increased but little change in etch profile was observed. Based on these results, the optimal etching conditions of ZnO thin film were selected. Finally, the etching of ZnO thin films with a high degree of anisotropy of approximately $75^{\circ}{\sim}80^{\circ}$ without the redepositions and residues was successfully achieved at the etching conditions of 20% $Cl_2$ concentration, coil rf power of 1000 W, dc-bias voltage of 400 V, and gas pressure of 5 mTorr.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.17 no.11
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• pp.618-621
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• 2007

Chromium nitride (CrN) films were deposited on silicon substrate by RF magnetron sputtering assisted by inductive coupled nitrogen plasma without intentional substrate heating. Films were deposited with different levels of bombarding energy by nitrogen ions $(N^+)$ to investigate the influence of substrate bias voltage $(V_b)$ on the growth of CrN thin films. XRD spectra showed that the crystallographic structure of CrN films was strongly affected by substrate bias voltage. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) results showed that surface roughness and grain size of the CrN films varied significantly with bias voltage. For - 80 $V_b$ depositions, the CrN films showed bigger grain sizes than those of other bias voltage conditions. The lowest surface roughness of 0.15 nm was obtained from the CrN films deposited at .130 $V_b$.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.207-212
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• 2013

A new CMOS voltage-bias differential LC voltage-controlled oscillator (LC-VCO) with active source degeneration is proposed. The proposed degeneration technique preserves the quality factor of the LC-tank which leads to improvement in phase noise of VCO oscillators. The proposed VCO shows the high figure of merit (FOM) with large tuning range, low power, and small chip size compared to those of conventional voltage-bias differential LC-VCO. The proposed VCO implemented in 0.18-${\mu}m$ CMOS shows the phase noise of -118 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset oscillating at 5.03 GHz, tuning range of 12%, occupies 0.15 $mm^2$ of chip area while dissipating 1.44 mW from 0.8 V supply.

• Journal of Magnetics
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.140-144
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• 2011

We report on a numerical calculation study of two new functional properties in magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs), negative dynamic resistance and RF amplification. The magnetic dynamics in a conventional CoFeB/MgO/CoFeB MTJ with in-plane magnetization was investigated using a macro-spin model simulation. To examine the influence of thermal fluctuations, random external magnetic fields were also included. Using a voltage controlled bias circuit, the negative dynamic resistance was obtained from time averaged I-V characteristics at both 0 K and 300 K under appropriate external magnetic fields and bias voltages. Using this negative dynamic resistance property, we demonstrated RF amplification with a 100 MHz high frequency signal. Sizable RF amplification gain was observed without thermal fluctuation. However, at 300 K, the RF signal was not amplified because low frequency magnetization dynamics were dominant.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.202-205
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• 2010

In this study, the etch properties of $Al_2O_3$ thin films deposited by atomic layer deposition were investigated as a function of the $O_2$ content in $BCl_3$/Ar inductively coupled plasma. The experiments were performed by comparing the etch rates and selectivity of $Al_2O_3$ over the hard mask materials as functions of the input plasma parameters, such as the gas mixing ratio, DC-bias voltage, ratio-frequency (RF) power and process pressure. The highest obtained etch rate was 477 nm/min at an RF power of 700 W, $O_2$ to $BCl_3$/Ar gas ratio of 15%, DC-bias voltage of -100 V and process pressure of 15 mTorr. The deposition occurred on the surfaces when the amount of $O_2$ added to the $BCl_3$/Ar gas was too high at a low DC-bias voltage or high process pressure. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy was used to investigate the chemical reactions on the etched surface.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.150-156
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• 2004

Boron nitride thin films were deposited on Si(100) substrate by RF (Radio-frequency) UBM (Unbalanced Magnetron) sputtering system. The effect of working pressure and substrate bias voltage on microstructure and compressive stress of boron nitride thin films has been investigated. In high working pressure, the alignment of hBN laminates increased with substrate bias voltage, in low working pressure, however, it was high in low substrate bias voltage. Compressive stress evolution and surface morphology of deposited BN films are closely related with the alignment of hBN laminates. The cBN phase without high compressive stress could be nucleated on hBN thin film by controlling the alignment of hBN laminates.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.4 no.2 s.11
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• pp.11-14
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• 2005

In plasma processing reactors, it is common practice to control plasma density and ion bombardment energy by manipulating excitation voltage and frequency. In this paper, a dually excited capacitively coupled rf plasma reactor is self-consistently simulated with a three moment model. Effects of phase differences between primary and secondary voltage waves, simultaneously modulated at various combinations of commensurate frequencies, on plasma properties are investigated. The simulation results show that plasma potential and density as well as primary self-dc bias are nearly unaffected by the phase lag between the primary and the secondary voltage waves. The results also show that, with the secondary frequency substantially lower than the primary frequency, secondary self·do bias remains constant regardless of the phase lag. As the secondary frequency approaches to the primary frequency, however, the secondary self-dc bias becomes greatly altered by the phase lag, and so does the ion bombardment energy at the secondary electrode. These results demonstrate that ion bombardment energy can be more carefully controlled through plasma simulation.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.560-566
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• 2004

In this paper, the electrical and emission properties of electrodeless fluorescent lamp were discussed using the inductively coupled plasma (ICP) with the variation of argon gas pressure and RF power. The RF output was applied to the antenna in the range of 5∼50 W at 13.56 MHz. The internal plasma voltage of the chamber and the probe current were measured while varying the supply voltage to the Langmuir probe in the range of －100V∼＋100V. When the pressure of argon gas was increased, electric current was decreased. There was a significant electric current increase from 10 to 30 W. Also, when the RF power was increased, electron density was increased. Also, the emission spectrum, Ar- I lins, luminance were investigated. At this time, the input parameter for ICP RF plasma, Ar gas pressure and RF power were applied in the range of 10∼60 mTorr, 10∼300 W, respectively. This implies that this method can be used to find an optimal RF power for efficient light illumination in an electrodeless fluorescent lamp.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea TC
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• v.42 no.2 s.332
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• pp.87-92
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• 2005

In this paper, adaptive bias circuit and PBG structure have been employed to suppress IMD and improve PAE (Power Added Efficiency) of the power amplifier. It is controlling the gate 'dc' bias voltage with the envelope of the input RF signal. and The PBG structure has been employed on the output port of power amplifier . The proposed power amplifier using adaptive bias circuit and PBG has been improved the IMG by 3 dBc, and the average PAE by $35.54\%$, respectively.

• Proceedings of the IEEK Conference
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• 2004.06b
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• pp.347-350
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• 2004

The substrate parameters of Si MOSFET equivalent circuit model were directly extracted from measured S-Parameters in the GHz region by using simple 2-port parameter equations. Using the above extract ion method, bias and gate length dependent curves of substrate parameters in the RF region are obtained by varying drain voltage at several short channel devices with various gate lengths. These extract ion data will greatly contribute to scalable RF nonlinear substrate modeling.