Herein we investigated the effect of the conductive agent on the electrochemical performance of the SiOx anode. SiOx anodes have a relatively low volume expansion (~160%) compared to Pure-silicon, but have a problem in that they have a poor electrical conductivity characteristic. In this study, physical and electrochemical measurements were performed using two 0-dimensional amorphous carbon conductive agents with different crystallinity and surface area. The crystal structure of the conductive agents and the local graphitization degree were analyzed through XRD and Raman, and the surface area of the particles was observed through BET. In addition, the electrical performance according to the graphitization degree of the conductive agents was confirmed through a 4-point probe. As a result of the electrochemical cycle and rate performance, it was confirmed that the performance of SiOx using a conductive agent having a low graphitization degree and a high surface area was improved. The results in this study suggest that the graphitization degree and surface area of the amorphous carbon conductive agent may play an important role in the SiOx electrode.

All-solid-state thin-film battery can realize the integration of electronic circuits into small devices. However, a high voltage cathode material is required to compensate for the low energy density. Therefore, it is necessary to study all-solid-state thin-film battery based on the high voltage cathode material LNMO. Nevertheless, the electrochemical properties deteriorate due to the problem of the interface between LiNi_0.5Mn_1.5O₄ (LNMO) and the solid electrolyte LiPON. In this study, to solve this problem, amorphous V₂O₅ was deposited as an interlayer between LNMO and LiPON. We confirmed the possibility of improving cycle performance of LNMO based thin-film battery. We expect that the results of this study can extend the battery lifespan of small devices using LNMO based all-solid-state thin-film battery.

a-Si is commonly considered as a primary candidate for the formation of passivation layer in heterojunction (HIT) solar cells. However, there are some problems when using this material such as significant losses due to recombination and parasitic absorption. To reduce these problems, a wide bandgap material is needed. A wide bandgap has a positive influence on effective transmittance, reduction of the parasitic absorption, and prevention of unnecessary epitaxial growth. In this paper, the adoption of a-SiO_x:H as the intrinsic layer was discussed. To increase lifetime and conductivity, oxygen concentration control is crucial because it is correlated with the thickness, bonding defect, interface density (D_it), and band offset. A thick oxygenrich layer causes the lifetime and the implied open-circuit voltage to drop. Furthermore the thicker the layer gets, the more free hydrogen atoms are etched in thin films, which worsens the passivation quality and the efficiency of solar cells. Previous studies revealed that the lifetime and the implied voltage decreased when the a-SiOx thickness went beyond around 9 nm. In addition to this, oxygen acted as a defect in the intrinsic layer. The D_it increased up to an oxygen rate on the order of 8%. Beyond 8%, the D_it was constant. By controlling the oxygen concentration properly and achieving a thin layer, high-efficiency HIT solar cells can be fabricated.

We investigated the electrical characteristics of amorphous silicon-zinc-tin-oxide (a-SZTO) thin films deposited by RF-magnetron sputtering at room temperature depending on the deposition time. We fabricated a thin film transistor (TFT) with a bottom gate structure and various channel thicknesses. With increasing channel thickness, the threshold voltage shifted negatively from -0.44 V to -2.18 V, the on current (I_on) and field effect mobility (μFE) increased because of increasing carrier concentration. The a-SZTO film was fabricated and analyzed in terms of the contact resistance and channel resistance. In this study, the transmission line method (TLM) was adopted and investigated. With increasing channel thickness, the contact resistance and sheet resistance both decreased.

Raman spectra of a-C:H thin films deposited with an unbalanced magnetron sputtering system showed that the G peak shifted to a higher wavenumber as the target power density increased and ID/IG ratio increased from 0.902 to 1.012. Moreover, the transmittance of a-C:H films fabricated at 60 nm tended to decrease with increasing target power density; at 550 nm in the visible light region, the transmittance decreased from 69% to 58%. The rms surface roughness values of the a-C:H thin films decreased with increasing target power density, and varied from 1.11 nm to 0.71 nm. In order to achieve efficient light trapping, the light scattering at the rough interface must be enhanced. Consequently, the surface roughness of the thin film will decrease with the target power density. Further, the refractive index and reflectivity of the a-C:H thin films increased with increasing target power density; however, the Brewster angle decreased with the target power density. Hence, dye-sensitized solar cells using an a-C:H antireflective coating increased the CE, VOC, and JSC by approximately 8.6%, 5.5%, and 4.5%, respectively.

This paper reports the microstructure and electrochemical properties of Si-Al-Fe ternary amorphous alloys prepared by rapid solidification as an anode for lithium secondary batteries. The microstructure was analyzed using XRD and HR-TEM with EDS mapping. In accordance with DSC analysis, annealing was performed to crystallize the active nano-Si in the amorphous alloy. Thus, nano-Si forms (~80 nm) embedded in the matrix alloy, such as Fe₂Al₃Si₃, FeSi₂, and Fe_0.42Si_2.67, were successfully synthesized. The electrode based on the Si-Al-Fe ternary alloy delivered an initial discharge capacity of approximately 700 mAh ^g-1, and exhibited a high Coulombic efficiency of 99.0~99.6% from the 2^nd to 70^th cycles.

We investigated the tribological properties of amorphous carbon (a-C) films deposited with CrC interlayers of various thicknesses as the adhesive layer. A-C and CrC thin films were deposited using the unbalanced magnetron (UBM) sputtering method with graphite and chromium as the targets. CrC films as the interlayer were fabricated under a-C films, and various structural, surface, and tribological properties of a-C films deposited with various CrC interlayer thicknesses were investigated. With various CrC interlayer thicknesses under a-C films, the tribological properties of CrC/a-C films were improved; the increased film thickness exhibited a maximum high hardness of over 27.5 GPa, high elastic modulus of over 242 GPa, critical load of 31 N, residual stress of 1.85 GPa, and a smooth surface below 0.09 nm at the condition of 30-nm CrC thickness.

This research introduces the sputtered IZO thin film transistor (TFT) with solution-processed Al₂O₃ diffusion layer. IZO is one of the most commonly used amorphous oxide semiconductor (AOS) TFT. However, most AOS TFTs have many defects that degrade performance. Especially oxygen vacancy in the active layer. In previous research, aluminum was used as a carrier suppressor by binding the oxygen vacancy and making a strong bond with oxygen atoms. In this paper, we use a solution-processed Al₂O₃ diffusion layer to fabricate stable IZO TFTs. A double-layer solution-processed Al2O3-sputtered IZO TFT showed better performance and stability, compared to normal sputtered IZO TFT.

Highly photosensitive and wide bandgap amorphous silicon oxide (a-SiO_x:H) films were developed at low temperature ranges (100~150℃) with employing plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition by optimizing H₂/SiH₄ gas ratio and CO₂ flow. Photosensitivity more than 10⁵ and wide bandgap (1.81~1.85 eV) properties were used for making the a-SiO_x:H thin film solar cells, which exhibited a high open circuit voltage of 0.987 V at the substrate temperature of 100℃. In addition, a power conversion efficiency of 6.87% for the cell could be improved up to 7.77% by employing a new n-type nc-SiO_x:H/ZnO:Al/Ag triple back-reflector that offers better short circuit currents in the thin film photovoltaic devices.

We have investigated the characteristics of amorphous silicon (a-Si) thin-film solar cell by inserting barrier layer. The conversion efficiency of a-Si thin-film solar cells on graphite substrate shows nearly zero because of the surface roughness of the graphite substrate. To enhance the performance of solar cells, the surface morphology of the back side were modified by changing the barrier layer on graphite. The surface roughness of graphite substrate with the barrier layer grown by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) reduced from ~2 um to ~75 nm. In this study, the combination of the barrier layer on graphite substrate is important to increase solar cell efficiency. We achieved ~ 7.8% cell efficiency for an a-Si thin-film solar cell on graphite substrate with SiNx/SiOx stack barrier layer.

In this study, we proposed an a-IGZO (amorphous In-Ga-Zn-O) TFT (thin-film transistor) with off-planed source/drain structure. Furthermore, two different electrode materials (ITO and Ti) were applied to the source and drain contacts for performance improvement of a-IGZO TFTs. When the ITO with a large work-function and the Ti with a small work-function are applied to drain electrode and source contact, respectively, the electrical performances of a-IGZO TFTs were improved; an increased driving current, a decreased leakage current, a high on-off current ratio, and a reduced subthreshold swing. As a result of gate bias stress test at various temperatures, the off-planed S/D a-IGZO TFTs showed a degradation mechanism due to electron trapping and both devices with ITO-drain or Ti-drain electrode revealed an equivalent instability.

Transparent amorphous In-Si-O (ISO)/Ag/In-Si-O (ISO) has been reported for low emissivity(low-e) applications. Effective Si doping into the In2O3 matrix led to a completely amorphous ISO film aswell as a low resistivity and a high optical transmittance. The optical and electrical performances wereexamined by measuring transmittance with a UV-VIS spectrophotometer and resistivity with a Hall effectmeasurement. Consequently, low-e glass with ISO/Ag/ISO showed a high transparency in the visibleregion and low emissivity in the infrared region, indicating that ISO is a promising amorphoustransparent electrode for low-e glass.

We have investigated the structural and electrical properties of Si-Zn-Sn-O (SZTO) thin filmsdeposited by RF magnetron sputtering at various deposition temperatures from RT to 350℃. All theSZTO thin fims are amorphous structure. The mobility of SZTO thin film has been changed dependingon the deposition temperature. SZTO thin film transistor shows mobility of 8.715 ㎠/Vs at roomtemperature. We performed the electrical stress test by applying gate and drain voltage. SZTO thin filmtransistor shows good stability deposited at room temperature while showing poor stability deposited at350℃. As a result, the electrical performance and stability have been changed depending on depositiontemperature mainly because high deposition temperature loosened the amorphous structure generatingmore oxygen vacancies.

To observe the optical characteristic of oxide semiconductor depending on the degree of bonding structures, SiOC, ZnO and IGZO were prepared by the RF magnetron sputter system and chemical vapor deposition. Generally, crystal ZnO, amorphous SiOC and IGZO changed the optical characteristics in according to the electro-chemical behavior due to the oxygen vacancy at an interface between different groups. Transmittance of SiOC and IGZO with amorphous structures was higher than that of ZnO with crystal structure, because of lowering the carrier concentration due to the recombination of electron and holes carriers as oxygen vacancies. Besides, the energy gap of amorphous SiOC and IGZO was higher than the energy gap of crystal ZnO. The diffusion mobility of holes is higher than the drift mobility of electrons.

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon (а-Si:H) layers deposited by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) are investigated for use in silicon hetero-junction solar cells employing n-type crystalline silicon (c-Si) substrates. The optical and structural properties of silicon hetero-junction devices have been characterized using spectroscopy ellipsometry and high resolution cross-sectional transmission electron micrograph (HRTEM). In addition, the effective carrier lifetime is measured by the quasi-steady-state photocoductance (QSSPC) method. We have studied on the correlation between the order of а-Si:H and the passivation quality at the interface of а-Si:H/c-Si. Base on the result, we have fabricated a silicon hetero-junction solar cell incorporating the а-Si:H passivation layer with on open circuit voltage (Voc) of 637 mV.

Recently, amorphous oxide semiconductors (AOSs) based thin-film transistors (TFTs) have received considerable attention for application in the next generation displays industry. The research trends of AOSs based TFTs investigation have focused on the high device performance. The electrical properties of the TFTs are influenced by trap density. In particular, the threshold voltage (Vth) and subthreshold swing (SS) essentially depend on the semiconductor/gate-insulator interface trap. In this article, we investigated the effects of Ar plasma-treated SiO2 insulator on the interfacial property and the device performances of amorphous indium gallium zinc oxide (a-IGZO) TFTs. We report on the improvement in interfacial characteristics between a-IGZO channel layer and gate insulator depending on Ar power in plasma process, since the change of treatment power could result in different plasma damage on the interface.