Thin film transistor including oxidized film by oxidation of the surface of a channel area semiconductor

Abstract

A thin film transistor (TFT) has a substrate. There is provided on the substrate a gate electrode, a gate insulating layer, a semiconductor layer, ohmic contact layers, electrodes (i.e., a source electrode and a drain electrode), and a protective layer in this order. An oxidized film is provided on a channel area of the semiconductor layer. With the arrangement, it is possible, without providing a channel protective layer, to prevent undesirable etching to the channel area, thereby greatly reducing the number of defective products. Since it is not necessary to make the semiconductor layer thicker than is required, it is possible to minimize the occurrence that the TFT characteristic is affected by the projected light. In addition, it is possible to realize miniaturization and to get a great aperture ratio when used as a switching element in a liquid crystal display (LCD) device.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.