Improved Electrical Performance of In2O3-Based Thin-Film Transistors via MXene Intercalation and Application Exploration in Logic Inverters

Based on atomic layer deposition (ALD) technology and 2-D material Ti3C2Tx MXene intercalation strategy, the low-temperature fabrication of low-voltage-driven high-performance In2O3 thin-film transistor (TFT) has been realized. Ti3C2Tx MXene intercalation is introduced between Al2O3 dielectric layer and In2O3 channel layer to construct the In2O3/MXene/Al2O3 TFT. The connectivity of MXene nanosheet is adjusted by changing the concentration of MXene, and the electrical properties of TFTs are optimized. The results demonstrate that In2O3/MXene/Al2O3 TFT presents the best performance with the mobility of 15.41 cm2/ $\text{V}\cdot \text{s}$ and significant bias stress stability when the concentration of MXene is 2 mg/mL. The resistance load inverter based on In2O3/MXene/Al2O3 TFT exhibits a gain of up to 11.6 at 5 V and good voltage transmission characteristics, which conforms to the operation rules of logic “not gate.” Low-frequency noise (LFN) assists mechanism analysis of MXene intercalation to improve TFT performance. The experimental results show that MXene intercalation structure can effectively improve the performance and operational stability of In2O3-based TFTs, providing a reliable experimental path and solution for device performance optimization.