Current status and future prospects of poly-Si devices

Thin-film polysilicon insulated-gate field effect transistors deposited on glass substrates are the subject of worldwide research and development activity. The greatest motivation for this is their application to flat-panel displays, including, in particular, active-matrix liquid crystal displays (AMLCDs), where they offer several important advantages over the more mature amorphous silicon thin-film transistor (TFT) technology. One of these is the ready availability of both n-type and p-type poly-Si TFTs. Polysilicon-on-glass CMOS TFT technology may be used to fabricate AMLCD drivers on the display substrate; it can also be used in a variety of other applications such as printers, scanners, smart sensors and neural networks. This review identifies the major achievements and key issues in the development of poly-Si TFT technology for both display and nondisplay applications