The advantage of OTFT technology is that large-area circuits can be manufactured on flexible substrates using a lowcost solution process such as inkjet printing. Compared to silicon-based inorganic semiconductor processes, the process temperature is lower and the process time is shorter, so it can be widely applied to fields that do not require high electron mobility. Materials that have utility as electrode materials include carbon that can be solution-processed, transparent carbon thin films, and metallic nanoparticles, etc. are being studied. Recently, a technology has been developed to facilitate charge injection by coating the surface of the Al electrode with solution-processable titanium oxide (TiOx), which can greatly improve the performance of OTFT. In order to commercialize OTFT technology, an appropriate method is to use a complementary circuit with excellent reliability and stability. For this, insulators and channel semiconductors using organic materials must have stability in the air. In this study, carbon-doped Mo (MoC) thin films were fabricated with different graphite target power densities via unbalanced magnetron sputtering (UBM). The influence of graphite target power density on the structural, surface area, physical, and electrical properties of MoC films was investigated. MoC thin films deposited by the unbalanced magnetron sputtering method exhibited a smooth and uniform surface. However, as the graphite target power density increased, the rms surface roughness of the MoC film increased, and the hardness and elastic modulus of the MoC thin film increased. Additionally, as the graphite target power density increased, the resistivity value of the MoC film increased. In the performance of an organic thin film transistor using a MoC gate electrode, the carrier mobility, threshold voltage, and drain current on/off ratio (I_on/I_off) showed 0.15 cm²/V·s, -5.6 V, and 7.5×10⁴, respectively.

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.

TiN thin films were fabricated using an unbalanced magnetron sputtering (UBMS) system, and their structure and surface characteristics as well as their optical and tribological properties were evaluated. The hardness, elastic modulus, adhesive force, surface roughness, and transmittance of the Ti thin films fabricated using the UBMS system were 11.5 GPa, 103 GPa, 27.5 N, 2.45 nm and 20%, respectively. The TiN films prepared with various proportions of nitrogen as the reaction gas exhibited maximum values for the hardness, elastic modulus, critical load, RMS roughness and transmittance of approximately 19.2 GPa, 182 GPa, 27.3 N, 0.98 nm, and 85%, respectively. Moreover, the TiN thin film fabricated under the condition of 30 sccm nitrogen gas showed the optimal physical properties. In summary, the TiN thin films fabricated using the UBMS system exhibited excellent hardness, elastic modulus, adhesion, and smooth surface in addition to good hydrophilic properties.

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.

Various Ni-doped carbon (C：Ni) thin films were fabricated using different Ni target power densities by unbalanced magnetron sputtering (UBM). The effects of target power density on the structural, physical, surface, and electrical properties of C：Ni films were investigated. The UBM C：Ni thin films exhibited uniformly smooth surfaces. The rms surface roughness and friction coefficient values of the C：Ni films decreased with the increase in target power density. The physical properties of the films such as hardness and elastic moduli increased while their electrical properties such as resistivity decreased with the increase in the target power density. These results show that an increase of the power density leads to an increase in the proportion of Ni and nanocrystallization of the amorphous carbon film; this contributes to the changes observed in the physical and electrical characteristics.

Mo doped carbon (C:Mo) thin films were fabricated with various Mo target power densities by unbalanced magnetron sputtering (UBM). The effects of target power density on the surface, structural, and electrical properties of C:Mo films were investigated. UBM sputtered C:Mo thin films exhibited smooth and uniform surfaces. However, the rms surface roughness of C:Mo films were increased with the increase of target power density. Also, the resistivity value of C:Mo film as electrical properties was decreased with the increase of target power density. From the performance of organic thin filml transistor using conductive C:Mo gate electrode, the carrier mobility, threshold voltage, and on/off ratio of drain current (Ion/Ioff) showed 0.16 cm²/V·s, -6.0 V, and 7.7×10⁴, respectively.

Prevailing dissemination of machine tools and cutting technology have caused drastic developments of high speed dry machining with work materials of high hardness, and demands on the high-hardness-materials with high efficiency have become increasingly important in terms of productivity, cost reduction, as well as environment-friendly issue. Addition of Si to TiAlN has been known to form nano-composite coating with higher hardness of over 30 GPa and oxidation temperature over 1,000℃. However, it is not easy to add Si to TiAlN by using conventional PVD technologies. Therefore, Ti-Al-Si-N have been prepared by hybrid process of PVD with multiple target sources or PVD combined with PECVD of Si source gas. In this study, a single composite target of Ti-Al-Si was prepared by powder metallurgy of MA (mechanical alloying) and SPS (spark plasma sintering). Properties of he resulting alloying targets were examined. They revealed a microstructure with micro-sized grain of about 1~5 ㎛, and all the elements were distributed homogeneously in the alloying target. Hardness of the Ti-Al-Si-N target was about 1,127 Hv. Thin films of Ti-Al-Si-N were prepared by unbalanced magnetron sputtering method by using the home-made Ti-Al-Si alloying target. Composition of the resulting thin film of Ti-Al-Si-N was almost the same with that of the target. The thin film of Ti-Al-Si-N showed a hardness of 35 GPa and friction coefficient of 0.66.

Titanium oxide (TiO2) thin films were fabricated by unbalanced magnetron (UBM) sputtering. The fabricated TiO2 films were treated by oxygen plasma under various RF powers. We investigated the characteristics of oxygen plasma treatment on the surface, structural, and physical properties of TiO2 films prepared at various plasma treatment RF powers. UBM sputtered TiO2 films exhibited higher contact angle value, smooth surface, and amorphous structure. However, the rms surface roughness TiO2 films were rough, and the contact angle value was decreased with the increase of the plasma treatment RF power Also, the hardness value of TiO2 film as physical properties was slightly increased with the increase of the plasma treatment RF power. In the results, the performance of TiO2 films for self cleaning critically depended on the with the plasma treatment RF power.

The characterizations of zinc oxide (ZnO) buffer layers grown by unbalanced magnetron (UBM) sputtering under various substrate temperatures for inverted organic solar cells (IOSCs) were investigated. UBM sputter grown ZnO films exhibited higher crystallinity with increasing the substrate temperature, resulting in uniform and large grain size. Also, the electrical properties of ZnO films are improved with increasing substrate temperature. In the results, the performance of IOSCs critically depended on the substrate temperature during the film growth because the crystalllinity of the ZnO film affect the carrier mobility of the ZnO film.

TiC thin films were deposited on Si wafer by unbalanced magnetron sputtering (UBMS) system with two targets of graphite and titanium. During the TiC sputtering, the RF power was varied from 100 W to 175 W and the physical and electrical properties of TiC films were investigated. The hardness and rms surface roughness of TiC films were improved with increasing RF power and the maximum hardness about 24 GPa and the minimum rms surface roughness about 1.2 nm were obtained. The resistivity of TiC films was decreased with increasing RF power. Consequently, the physical and electrical properties of TiC film wewe improved with increasing RF power.