Fast spatial atomic layer deposition of Al₂O₃ at low temperature (<100 °C) as a gas permeation barrier for flexible organic light-emitting diode displays

The authors developed a high throughput (70 Å/min) and scalable space-divided atomic layer deposition (ALD) system for thin film encapsulation (TFE) of flexible organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays at low temperatures (<100 °C). In this paper, the authors report the excellent moisture barrier properties of Al₂O₃ films deposited on 2G glass substrates of an industrially relevant size (370 × 470 mm²) using the newly developed ALD system. This new ALD system reduced the ALD cycle time to less than 1 s. A growth rate of 0.9 Å/cycle was achieved using trimethylaluminum as an Al source and O₃ as an O reactant. The morphological features and step coverage of the Al₂O₃ films were investigated using field emission scanning electron microscopy. The chemical composition was analyzed using Auger electron spectroscopy. These deposited Al₂O₃ films demonstrated a good optical transmittance higher than 95% in the visible region based on the ultraviolet visible spectrometer measurements. Water vapor transmission rate lower than the detection limit of the MOCON test (less than 3.0 × 10⁻³ g/m² day) were obtained for the flexible substrates. Based on these results, Al₂O₃ deposited using our new high-throughput and scalable spatial ALD is considered a good candidate for preparation of TFE films of flexible OLEDs