As the fabrication technology used in FPDs(flat-panel displays) advances, the size of these panels is increasing and the pattern size is decreasing to the um range. Accordingly, a cleaning process during the FPD fabrication process is becoming more important to prevent yield reductions. The purpose of this study is to develop a FPD cleaning system and a cleaning process using a two-phase flow. The FPD cleaning system consists of two parts, one being a cleaning part which includes a two-phase flow nozzle, and the other being a drying part which includes an air-knife and a halogen lamp. To evaluate the particle removal efficiency by means of two-phase flow cleaning, silica particles 1.5μm in size were contaminated onto a six-inch silicon wafer and a four-inch glass wafer. We conducted cleaning processes under various conditions, i.e., DI water and nitrogen gas at different pressures, using a two-phase-flow nozzle with a gap distance between the nozzle and the substrate. The drying efficiency was also tested using the air-knife with a change in the gap distance between the air-knife and the substrate to remove the DI water which remained on the substrate after the two-phase-flow cleaning process. We obtained high efficiency in terms of particle removal as well as good drying efficiency through the optimized conditions of the two-phase-flow cleaning and air-knife processes.

A laser glass cutting system using a femto-second laser was evaluated for Flat Panel Display (FPD) glass. A theoretical analysis of the ablation threshold and depth is described using an explicit analytic form. Experiments for clean and deep grooves were performed using a 3W femto-second laser, and the relationships between the input energy and the scribing depth as well as the threshold energy are presented. Mechanical breaking after the scribing process was carried out and the results are compared with a theoretical method. It was found that a two-sided LCD panel glass can be cut clearly using the laser cutting method. The methodology was found to be very effective as a mass-production cutting system.