To compare the therapeutic efficacy in the management of granular myringitis, 15 patients with chronic granular myringitis were treated with antibiotic ear drops that were used twice to four times a day, and another 15 patients were treated with daily irrigation of the external canal with dilute vinegar solution. All patients treated with dilute vinegar solution had resolution of their original otorrhoea within three weeks, whereas two-thirds of patients recovered within three weeks when treated with antibiotic ear drops. The disadvantages of dilute vinegar therapy were canal irritation with pain and dizziness. When the therapeutic efficacy was compared statistically, a dry ear was attained in the dilute vinegar-treated group at six weeks and six months in the antibiotic ear drop treated group (p<0.01). These results suggest that very low pH therapy using dilute vinegar solution is definitely effective in the management of granular myringitis.

The performance of poly-Si TFTs and CMOS circuits with various active films prepared by different deposition processes and annealing methods, such as SPC(Solid Phase Crystallization) and ELA(Excimer Laser Annealing), have been investigated. We have examined the effects of DC characteristics of poly-Si TFT, such as mobility, threshold voltage and ON- OFF- current level, on the dynamic performance of the CMOS circuits.

We have fabricated poly-Si TFT devices and CMOS circuits with various process conditions, such as active layer preparation source gases, annealing method, film thickness and source/drain impurity doping. The TFTs with ELA active films exhibit much higher field effect mobility and ON/OFF current ratio than those with SPC active film due to low intragranular trap state density. The TFTs with active film deposited using Si2H6 have higher mobility and sub-threshold slope than those with active film deposited using SiH4 because of the large poly-Si grain size and less grain boundary defects. We have observed that the device ON-current, mobility and VTH are the dominant characteristics to control the operation speed of CMOS circuits. We have also found that the effects of active film thickness and source/drain doping process on the performance of CMOS ring oscillator may not be neglected and that it should be optimized for AMLCD applications.

A new oxidation process of the poly Silicon thin films has been demonstrated, where the amorphous silicon thin film was oxidized by ECR plasma at room temperature and then crystallized at 600°C for 30hrs(pre-oxidation). For comparison, amorphous silicon thin film was oxidized after crystallization(post-oxidation). The interface roughness turned out to be only 3Å in case of the pre-oxidation process, while the post-oxidation showed about 8Å of the interface roughness. The pre-oxidized TFT showed the constant mobility at high gate voltages, the post-oxidized TFT showed serious degradation of the mobility at high gate voltages.

Silicon thin films were deposited by Electron Cyclotron Resonance PECVD using silane as a source gas at room temperature. Deposited films were crystallized either by conventional furnace annealing(FA) or by rapid thermal annealing (RTA) process. The films deposited on SiO2/Si wafer substrates were Amorphous or microcrystalline depending on the microwave power. Deposited films were annealed at 600TC in a furnace. As expected, higher crystallinity was obtained in the case of the Amorphous films than the microcrystalline films after 7.5 hours annealing. It took 15 hours at 600δC for the Amorphous films to reach their maximum crystallinity in case of FA, but it only took 1 second at 900 δC for RTA. In addition, it was shown that RTA can be applied to the rapid crystallization of Amorphous silicon thin films deposited on a fused quartz substrate utilizing a new film structure.

Microcrystalline silicon films were formed at room temperature without hydrogen dilution by ECR PECVD. Microwave power more than 400 W was necessary to get crystalline films and the crystallinity increased with the power thereafter. Addition of hydrogen and argon enhanced the crystalline phase formation and the deposition rate, the reason of which was found that hydrogen etched silicon films and argon addition drastically increased the etch rate. Annealing of the films showed that microcrystalline silicon films formed by ECR PECVD have a small fraction of amorphous phase. TFT's using silicon nitride and doped/undoped microcrystalline silicon films were fabricatedd with whole processes at room temperature.

Silicon nitride thin films were deposited on single crystalline silicon substrates at room temperature by ECR PECVD with SiH4 and N2 as source gases and the electrical properties were analyzed. The dominant conduction mechanism in a high field was Poole-Frenkel emission. A ledge in I-V curve was observed in the first voltage ramp and it was found to originate from the field reduction at the injecting electrode due to the charge trapped in deep traps in the film. It also turned out that the ledge is a characteristic of monopolar conduction. A new interpretation of the current at low field — tunneling into trap states — was proposed and the current variations according to the field and temperature could be well explained.