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The great toe partialnail preserving transfer technique is another modification for distal thumb reconstruction in composite defects at or below the interphalangeal joint of the thumb. Noting the size difference of the nail width between the great toe and thumb, the authors dissected only a thumb nail width and skin flap from the great toe, leaving the remainder of the medial skin flap and nail of the great toe at the donor site. A total of 25 cases between 1993 and 1996 were performed using this technique, and the mean followup period was more than 12 months. The reconstructed thumb had a better cosmesis with a more natural appearance. At longterm followup, the thumb nail width decreased an average of 1.8 mm, but the pulp volume was almost the same as that of the normal contralateral side. The average static 2point discrimination was less than 9.0 mm. In cases with preserved interphalangeal joint, an average of 48 degrees of range of motion with keypinch of 80 percent of that of the normal contralateral thumb was achieved. The final appearance of the donor site with partial nail looks like a brachymetatarsia. Plast. Reconstr. Surg.101 114, 1998.

Pt nanocrystals using as tunneling and control layers were investigated for nonvolatile memory application. A Pt layer was deposited by electron-beam evaporation and transformed into well-separated nanocrystals by rapid thermal annealing at . The fabricated Pt nanocrystals had a density of and an average size of . The capacitance-voltage measurements demonstrate that the nonvolatile memory with Pt nanocrystals had a memory effect with flatband voltage shift under a gate voltage of . The device showed a competitive retention characteristic with a charge loss rate of 20% after .

Direct current biased remote plasma atomic layer deposition (RPALD) was developed and applied to deposit HfO2films, and these results were compared with those of RPALD. DC biased RPALD system exhibits effective features that allow the plasma density to be controlled by dc bias. When dc bias was applied to the radio frequency (RF) plasma, the amount of free radicals and ions were increased. The electrical properties of HfO2, such as the effective oxide thickness (EOT) and the breakdown voltage, were improved by dc bias when compared to those of RPALD. This is due to the relatively high amount of free radicals controlled by dc bias.

We investigated the effects of different annealing ambients on the physical and electrical properties of lanthanum oxide (La2O3)films grown by remote plasma atomic layer deposition (RPALD). Rapid thermal annealing was carried out at 800°Cfor 1 min in O2, N2, and vacuum ambients. The chemical bonding states at the interface between the Si substrate and the La2O3films were analyzed using X-ray photoemission spectroscopy. The amount of OH groups that were absorbed from air in the La2O3films decreased after annealing at 800°C. La2O3and its interfacial layer were affected by the different annealing ambients. The electrical properties of the La2O3films were studied using capacitance–voltage and current–voltage plots. Without annealing treatment, the flatband voltage (VFB)for the La2O3film was measured to be −0.31 eV. When La2O3was annealed at 800°Cin N2and O2ambients, positive shifts of 0.16 and 0.64 eV, respectively, were observed.

Pt nanocrystals using HfO2as tunneling and control layers were investigated for nonvolatile memory application. A Pt layer was deposited by electron-beam evaporation and transformed into well-separated nanocrystals by rapid thermal annealing at 700°C. The fabricated Pt nanocrystals had a density of 2.1×1012cm−2and an average size of 3.7nm. The capacitance–voltage measurements demonstrate that the nonvolatile memory with Pt nanocrystals had a memory effect with ∼0.9Vflatband voltage shift under a gate voltage of 5V. The device showed a competitive retention characteristic with a charge loss rate of 20% after 104s.

We investigated the thermal stability and physical properties of nitrided Hf-silicate after applying N2and N2Oplasma treatments. The Hf-silicate film was created by remote-plasma atomic layer deposition using Hf[N(CH3)C2H5]4and Si[N(CH3)]3Has source gases and O2plasma as the oxidant. After rapid thermal annealing in N2ambient, the Hf silicate crystallized at 800°C, while Hf-silicate films after the N2and N2Oplasma treatments remained amorphous after annealing at 800°C. Remote-plasma treatment of Hf-silicate resulted in a shift of the O 1s peaks to a lower binding energy. The increase in peak intensities of the Si–O–N, Si–O–Hf, and Si–O bonds at the interface after annealing was higher after N2Oplasma treatment than after N2plasma treatment. The accumulation capacitances of an as-grown Hf-silicate metal-oxide-semiconductor structure after N2plasma treatment show that it has a better capacitance density (280pF)than the same structure after N2Oplasma treatment (235pF). The equivalent oxide thickness values for the Hf-silicate films after N2and N2Oplasma treatments are 3.36 and 3.8nm, respectively.

Three different buffer layers on a Si substrate were grown to investigate the interfacial layer effect during HfO2deposition and thermal annealing. The three different buffer layers were the very thin Al2O3, remote plasma nitridation (RPN)-treated Al2O3, and RPN-treated HfO2films. HfO2films were then grown on these three different buffer layers by a remote plasma atomic layer deposition method. The HfO2films with RPN-treated buffer layers retarded silicate formation or growth of an interfacial layer more effectively than those without RPN treatment. The HfO2films with an RPN-treated HfO2buffer layer showed the lowest effective oxide thickness and those with an RPN-treated buffer layer exhibited low leakage current density. The effective fixed-oxide charge density of the HfO2film with an RPN-treated HfO2buffer layer showed the lowest value of 3.60×1011∕cm2compared to the other films. As the annealing temperature increased, the flatband voltage (VFB)for the HfO2films was shifted and became close to the ideal VFB. The interface stability of HfO2with a nitrided buffer layer formed by RPN treatments resulted in the improvement of the electrical properties of HfO2films.