Patent Describes Using MgO as ‘Breakthrough Material' for Enhancing Displays
Two tech firms landed a U.S. patent Tuesday for using magnesium oxide (MgO) as what they call a “breakthrough material” for enhancing the performance of thin-film transistors that drive the pixels in most consumer displays. The patent (9,856,578), which describes…
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“methods of producing large grain or single crystal films,” was based on an April 2014 application and was assigned to Solar-Tectic and Blue Wave Semiconductors and names Ratnakar Vispute, Blue Wave’s owner, and Andrew Seiser, systems/process engineer, as the inventors. MgO thin films “have assumed significant importance in recent times” as a protective layer on the glass used in consumer displays and as an “intermediate buffer layer” between a semiconductor substrate and a ferroelectric film used in chip production, says the patent. As an insulating material, MgO “is not only highly transparent, but also has very high thermal conductivity, high thermal stability, and a high melting point,” said Solar-Tectic and Blue Wave in a Tuesday statement. “Perhaps most importantly, however, the new material has an unusual orientation which can enhance the preferred orientations of silicon and germanium.”