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Poly-(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) has been used as a negative friction layer in triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) owing to its high electronegativity and flexibility. With advantage of the PDMS, various materials design to...

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A method for significantly increasing the growth rates (GRs) of high-k oxide thin films grown via plasmaenhanced atomic layer deposition (PE-ALD) by enhancing the plasma density through the addition of Ar gas to the O 2 plasma oxidant was developed. This approach led to improvements of ∼60% in the saturation GRs of PE-ALD ZrO 2 , HfO 2 , and SiO 2 . Furthermore, despite the significantly higher GR enabled by PE-ALD, the mechanical and dielectric properties of the PE-ALD oxide films were similar or even superior to those of films grown via the conventional O 2 plasma process. Optical emission spectroscopy analyses in conjunction with theoretical calculation of the electron energy distribution function revealed that adding Ar gas to the O 2 plasma increased the density of high-energy electrons, thereby generating more O 2 plasma species, such as ions and radicals, which played a key role in improving the GRs and the properties of the films. This promising approach is expected to facilitate the high-volume manufacturing of films via PE-ALD, especially for use as gate insulators in thin-film transistor-based devices in the display industry. KEYWORDS: atomic layer deposition, O 2 /Ar plasma, oxide thin films, enhanced growth rates, high-energy electron temperature, increased plasma density

The correlation of RF impedance with Ar plasma parameters was analyzed in semiconductor etch equipment using inductively coupled plasma. Since the impedance measured by a VI probe installed behind the RF bias matcher had information for plasma and structural parts of chamber simultaneously, the impedance was corrected by excluding transmission line and peripheral parts of the bias substrate. The corrected impedance was compared with plasma parameters, such as plasma density and electron temperature. The coefficient of determination between the corrected plasma resistance and the theoretical formula of the resistance for bulk plasma was over 0.9 unlike the resistance measured by the VI probe. It is expected that the corrected RF impedance can assist in monitoring the status of plasma and maintaining the quality of the etch process in semiconductor mass production lines.

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