Deposition
ALD supply chain
Nanotechnology has fast become another potential source of revenue for
electronics’ companies around the world. Despite the opportunities there is
still a shortage of information and infrastructure to support some of the newly
Issue V 2009
introduced technologies. Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) is one of these areas
square4
and Dr Alec Reader, Director of the Nanotechnology Knowledge Transfer
.com
Network (NanoKTN) discusses the need for industry to use and build a
supply chain for ALD in nano-electronic devices, sensors and systems.
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ll electronics companies face the same structure as the material it is
the constant challenge to deposited on and the electrical
develop and commercialise properties of the newly created films
new products that are competitive in the improve the electronic performance of the
marketplace. To achieve this they are subsequent device. Using processes like
increasingly looking to the nanotechnology ALD allows manufacturers to control the
industry for new processes to manufacture electrical properties of the host material,
electronic devices. One such process is ALD that allowing for improved
is capable of building structures measuring to performance.
the atomic level. However, in order to fully
capitalise on these new processes, the challenge
is to establish a fluid supply chain that makes it
viable for this application of nanotechnology to
be effectively introduced.
ALD was first demonstrated in 1974 by Dr
Suntola in Finland and the commercial use of
these methods began with the need to deposit
dielectric films on MOS structures. Later, ALD
was developed for large area OLED substrates,
needed in the making of electroluminescent flat
panel displays. With nano-electronics becoming
further developed during the late 1990s and
early 2000s, the need for successful ALD
processes became even greater, as the demand
for producing thin conformal films of a specific
thickness became imperative.
Within nano-electronics, ALD is a thin film
deposition technique that deposits a material
onto a nanostructure. The process is repeated
until a thin film layer is created. The film adopts
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