Recent trends in the development of plasma display panels (PDPs) are reviewed in this article with special emphasis on materials. New developments in the panel structure, discharge gases and phosphors used, and drive methods have improved many of the display characteristics over a wide range of operating conditions. As a result, much progress has been seen in large-scale panel development; for example, 50-in. and 61-in. PDPs have been commercialized. Improvements in phosphor longevity, discharge gas efficiency, and characteristics of the protective layers can be attributed in part to materials solutions. The longevity of the blue phosphor has been improved by the development of new materials and a greater understanding of the phosphor deterioration mechanism. The luminous efficiency has been greatly increased by the use of high-density Xe gas. The protective-layer characteristics have been improved as a result of advancements in processes, materials, and analytical methods.

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We propose a new structure of the PLZT thin film optical TIR (Total Internal Reflection) switches with strip loaded type waveguides. Using these switches, we have achieved 2 GHz intensity modulation of LD light (0.83 µm) and 1 km optical fiber transmission. Both lumped constant electrode and traveling wave electrode were examined up to 26.5 GHz. From the calculation of velocity mismatch between the modulating wave and the light wave, it is estimated that the modulation bandwidth of these switches will be more than 100 GHz.

A depth profile of an Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) for a Bi2Sr2Ca1Cu2Ox/Bi2Sr2Cu1Oy/Bi2Sr2Ca1Cu2Oz structure was investigated. This multilayered structure was fabricated by an in situ sputtering process and used for sandwich-type Josephson junctions. A little diffusion of Ca atoms from a top layer into the Bi2Sr2Cu1Oy layer was observed. It was confirmed that selective sputter etching during the AES measurement did not occur so seriously. The transition width at the two interfaces was estimated as about 10 nm, which was close to the depth resolution of our AES measurement. In addition, the interdiffusion between a Bi-based oxide film and a MgO substrate was hardly observed.

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A simulation of the molecular arrangement of 10,12-pentacosadiynoic acid (PDA) Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) films has been carried out. The PDA molecules were optimized to local minimum energy structures by the molecular mechanics technique using Allinger's MM2 force field. The optimized molecules were arranged in the close-packed structures in a two-dimensional area where the closest atomic distances of the contacting molecules were restricted by the Van der Waals radii. The simulation results showed successful agreement with the reported experimental data.

A sandwich-type high-T c Josephson junction coupled with a coplanar-type transmission line was fabricated and heterodyne mixing characteristics were investigated. The junction was fabricated from a stacked film structure of Bi 2 Sr 2 CaCu 2 O 8+δ /Bi 2 Sr 2 NdCu 2 O 8+δ /Bi 2 Sr 2 CaCu 2 O 8+δ (BSCCO/BSNCO/BSCCO) and the transmission line was made of sputter-deposited Pt film. The junction had a rectangular shape of 20 µm × 7 µm. Current-voltage (I -V ) curves of the junction showed weak-link-type characteristics. Two microwave sources of a frequency synthesizer and a sweep oscillator were used as a local oscillator (LO: 20 GHz) and a radio frequency signal source (RF: 19 GHz) for heterodyne mixing experiments. Intermediate signal (IF: 1 GHz) was transmitted through the transmission line and detected by a power meter. The conversion efficiency of −44 dB was estimated for an LO oscillator level of −23 dB m at 5.7 K when the junction was biased at the point below the first Shapiro step.