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A study on H2 plasma treatment effect on a-IGZO thin film transistor

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Abstract

We report the effect of H2 plasma treatment on amorphous indium–gallium–zinc–oxide (a-IGZO) thin-film transistor (TFT). The changes in electrical characteristics and stability of the a-IGZO TFT treated by H2 plasma were evaluated under thermal stress. Each device exhibited a change in the subthreshold swing, turn on voltage shift, and hysteresis depending on the amount of hydrogen atom. It was found that there occurred a decrease of oxygen deficiency and an increase of hydrogen content in channel layer and channel/dielectric interface with increasing treatment time. The proper hydrogen dose well passivated the oxygen vacancies; however, more hydrogen dose acted as excessive donors. The change of oxygen vacancy and total trap charge were explained by the activation energy from Arrhenius plot. Through this study, we found that the optimized H2 plasma treatment brings device stability by affecting oxygen vacancy and trap content in channel bulk and channel/dielectric interface.

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Acknowledgment

This work was supported by a National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korean government (MEST) (No. 2011-0015436).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Materials Science and Engineering, Hanyang University, Seoul, 133-791, Korea

    Jihoon Kim, Seokhwan Bang, Seungjun Lee, Seokyoon Shin, Joohyun Park & Hyeongtag Jeon

  2. Department of Materials Science & Engineering, Ajou University, Woncheon-Dong, Yeongtong-Gu, Suwon, 443-739, Korea

    Hyungtak Seo

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  1. Jihoon Kim
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  2. Seokhwan Bang
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  3. Seungjun Lee
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  4. Seokyoon Shin
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  7. Hyeongtag Jeon
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Correspondence to Hyungtak Seo.

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Kim, J., Bang, S., Lee, S. et al. A study on H2 plasma treatment effect on a-IGZO thin film transistor. Journal of Materials Research 27, 2318–2325 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2012.199

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2012.199

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