Abstract
The optimum condition of plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition to deposite silicon nitride (SiNx) film and its application as a gate insulator of a-Si thin-film transistor (TFT) have been investigated. The internal stress of SiNx in the range of 4.3×109 dyn/cm2 tensile to 8.0×109 dyn/cm2 compressive is found to be controllable by changing the ratio of H2 and N2 in the source gases without affecting the optical band gap. Satisfactory TFT characteristics and high reliability are realized by using a gate insulator of SiNx having either stoichiometric or N-rich composition which shows the large optical band gap.