Jae-Eun Pi

Improvements in the bending performance and bias stability of flexible InGaZnO thin film transistors and optimum barrier structures for plastic poly(ethylene naphthalate) substrates

Amorphous indium gallium zinc oxide thin-film transistors (TFTs) were fabricated and characterized on flexible poly(ethylene naphthalate) (PEN) substrates. A hybrid inorganic/organic double-layered barrier layer structure was proposed for enhancing the permeability and the surface roughness of the PEN substrates, which was composed of a 3 μm-thick spin-coated organic layer and a 50 nm-thick atomic-layer-deposited Al2O3 inorganic layer. The saturation mobility, subthreshold swing, and on/off ratio of the TFTs on the PEN substrates with the proposed hybrid barrier structure were found to be approximately 15.5 cm2 V−1 s−1, 0.2 V dec−1, and 2.2 × 108, respectively. These good TFT performances were not degraded even under the mechanical bending situation at a curvature radius of 3.3 mm and after the repetitive bending cycles. Furthermore, the variations in turn-on voltage of the TFT were evaluated to be approximately as small as −0.1 and +1.6 V under the negative and positive-bias stress tests, respectively.

A Low-Power Scan Driver Circuit for Oxide TFTs

The scan driver composed of oxide thin-film transistors (TFTs) tends to exhibit anomalously high power consumption because the oxide TFT often has negative threshold voltage. In order to resolve this problem, we have invented a new scan driver circuit in which most TFTs are turned off with negative VGS and no TFT with zero VGS is located between the high and low supply voltages. As a result, we could maintain the power consumption within six times of the normal value in spite of the negative threshold voltage of the oxide TFT.

High-Performance Hybrid Complementary Logic Inverter through Monolithic Integration of a MEMS Switch and an Oxide TFT

A hybrid complementary logic inverter consisting of a microelectromechanical system switch as a promising alternative for the p-type oxide thin film transistor (TFT) and an n-type oxide TFT is presented for ultralow power integrated circuits. These heterogeneous microdevices are monolithically integrated. The resulting logic device shows a distinctive voltage transfer characteristic curve, very low static leakage, zero-short circuit current, and exceedingly high voltage gain.

Characterization of amorphous multilayered ZnO-SnO2 heterostructure thin films and their field effect electronic properties

Multilayered ZnO-SnO2 heterostructure thin films were produced using pulsed laser ablation of pie-shaped ZnO-SnO2 oxides target, and their structural and field effect electronic transport properties were investigated as a function of the thickness of the ZnO and SnO2 layers. The films have an amorphous multilayered heterostructure composed of the periodic stacking of the ZnO and SnO2 layers. The field effect electronic properties of amorphous multilayered ZnO-SnO2 heterostructure thin film transistors (TFTs) are highly dependent on the thickness of the ZnO and SnO2 layers. The highest electron mobility of 37 cm2/V s, a low subthreshold swing of a 0.19 V/decade, a threshold voltage of 0.13 V, and a high drain current on-to-off ratio of ∼1010 obtained for the amorphous multilayered ZnO(1.5 nm)-SnO2(1.5 nm) heterostructure TFTs. These results are presumed to be due to the unique electronic structure of an amorphous multilayered ZnO-SnO2 heterostructure film consisting of ZnO, SnO2, and ZnO-SnO2 interface layers.

Light-adaptable display for the future advertising service

ABSTRACT In this paper, a new light-adaptable display (LAD) structure with minimum power consumption is proposed for the future advertising service, and the demonstrated results are reported. An organic light-emitting diode with color reflection (colored OLED) was applied for the reflective- and emissive-mode device, and a guest-host liquid-crystal device (GH-LC) was adopted for the light shutter device. The current efficiency and reflectance of the colored OLED were 35.15 cd/A at 457 cd/m2 luminance and 63% for the yellow color, respectively. The measured contrast ratio of GH-LC was 15.5:1 at dark-room conditions, respectively. Transparent oxide thin-film transistors were used for the backplane, and their average mobility was 9.08 cm2/V s, with a 0.5 standard deviation. Through the optimization of the fabrication process and the structures of each device, the LAD adaptively operating according to the environmental illuminance from dark to 10,000 nits was successfully demonstrated. Moreover, a new LAD driving method was proposed for minimizing the power consumption.

Device characteristics comparisons for the InGaZnO thin film transistors fabricated on two-type surfaces of the plastic poly(ethylene naphthalate) substrates with hybrid barrier layers

The poly(ethylene naphthalate) (PEN) substrates have two sides of bare PEN and primer-coated surfaces treated to provide slip property for film production. Although the primer surface showed porous and inhomogeneous morphologies, a hybrid inorganic/organic double-layered barrier layer can effectively improve the surface roughness and permeability. The fabricated amorphous In-Ga-Zn-O thin-film transistors on the PEN substrates with hybrid barrier showed good performances and did not experience any degradation under the mechanical bending situation at a curvature radius of 3.3 mm. The variation in the threshold voltage was evaluated to be approximately −0.1/1.6 V under the negative/positive bias stress tests, respectively.

Non-uniform sampling and wide range angular spectrum method

A novel method is proposed for simulating free space field propagation from a source plane to a destination plane that is applicable for both small and large propagation distances. The angular spectrum method (ASM) was widely used for simulating near field propagation, but it caused a numerical error when the propagation distance was large because of aliasing due to under sampling. Band limited ASM satisfied the Nyquist condition on sampling by limiting a bandwidth of a propagation field to avoid an aliasing error so that it could extend the applicable propagation distance of the ASM. However, the band limited ASM also made an error due to the decrease of an effective sampling number in a Fourier space when the propagation distance was large. In the proposed wide range ASM, we use a non-uniform sampling in a Fourier space to keep a constant effective sampling number even though the propagation distance is large. As a result, the wide range ASM can produce simulation results with high accuracy for both far and near field propagation. For non-paraxial wave propagation, we applied the wide range ASM to a shifted destination plane as well.

Unusual instability mode of transparent all oxide thin film transistor under dynamic bias condition

We report a degradation behavior of fully transparent oxide thin film transistor under dynamic bias stress which is the condition similar to actual pixel switching operation in active matrix display. After the stress test, drain current increased while the threshold voltage was almost unchanged. We found that shortening of effective channel length is leading cause of increase in drain current. Electrons activate the neutral donor defects by colliding with them during short gate-on period. These ionized donors are stabilized during the subsequent gate-off period due to electron depletion. This local increase in doping density reduces the channel length.

Switchable subwavelength plasmonic structures with phase-change materials for reflection-type active metasurfaces in the visible region

In this work, a switchable plasmonic structure is proposed for reflection-type spatial light modulation in the visible range with subwavelength resolution. This structure is based on a metallic grating in which each resonant cavity couples the incident light into a gap surface plasmon mode and then reflects the light modulated in the cavity. By incorporating an ultrathin layer of the phase-change material Ge2Sb2Te5 at the entrance of the cavity, the optical modulation characteristic of the structure can be switched between two modes. Numerical investigations are conducted to verify the proposed structure, with the focused analysis of two common types of binary modulations: amplitude-only and phase-only modulations.

High-resolution TFT-LCD for spatial light modulator

SLM with very fine pixel pitch is needed for the holographic display system. Among various kinds of SLMs, commercially available high resolution LCoS has been widely used as a spatial light modulator. But the size of commercially available LCoS SLM is limited because the manufacturing technology of LCoS is based on the semiconductor process developed on small size Si wafer. Recently very high resolution flat panel display panel (~500ppi) was developed as a “retina display”. Until now, the pixel pitch of flat panel display is several times larger than the pixel pitch of LCoS. But considering the possibility of shrink down the pixel pitch with advanced lithographic tools, the application of flat panel display will make it possible to build a SLM with high spatial bandwidth product. We simulated High resolution TFT-LCD panel on glass substrate using oxide semiconductor TFT with pixel pitch of 20um. And we considered phase modulation behavior of LC(ECB) mode. The TFT-LCD panel is reflective type with 4-metal structure with organic planarization layers. The technical challenge for high resolution large area SLM will be discussed with very fine pixel.