ALD History Blog: ALD 2016: Travel notes

ALD History Blog: ALD 2016: Travel notes: The 16th International Conference on Atomic Layer Deposition ALD2016 (http://www.ald2016.ie), including the 3rd International Workshop on Atomic Layer Etching, was organized in Dublin, Ireland, July 24-27, 2016. I had a pleasure to participate at the conference as a speaker, poster presenter, and as an International Programme Committee member. This blog post shares my travel notes from conference, thereby continuing my series on travel notes first written for the ALD Russia 2015 workshop and thereafter for Baltic ALD 2015, my St Petersburg visit Nov 2015, and HERALD Helsinki seminar May 2016. 

Continue reading Riikkas ALD 2016 Travel notes here.

Trends in plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition

The mysterious Plasma ALD Guy (PAG) had a great time at ALD 2016 this past week. PAG presented a poster on Tuesday evening that was enjoyed by many. If you missed it, you can check it out here.

Based on the review 2013 to 2015 South Korea is in the lead judging by the number of PEALD publications followed by USA and Germany. Striking is the lack of PEALD publications coming from the leading ALD centers of Helsinki University, VTT and Aalto University.

The other observation is that >75% of all PEALD is performed for pretty basic ALD materials (Al2O3, AlN, TiO2) using basic ALD precursors like TMA. The Finnish ALD community has a strong tradition of focusing on new precursor chemistries and new materials and that may be an explanation why PEALD is not in the focus there.

You also see that Turkey is very strong represented in this field. Unfortunately many of the Turkish Scientists were not allowed to participate in ALD2016.