REVIEW OF THIN-FILM TECHNOLOGY IN AUTOMOBILE-INDUSTRY

A great amount of effort has been devoted to the constant improvement of such basic automobile performance as drivability, safety and enviro nmental protection. As a result, the total combination of various tech nologies has made it possible to produce safer and more comfortable au tomobiles. Among these technologies, surface and thin film techniques are mainly concerned with sensors, optics, electronics aud surface mod ification. This article first describes a new concept of thin film pro cessing in materials synthesis for low dimensional thin films based on particle-surface interaction during deposition. Some examples of prac tical applications of various thin films to automobiles are then given . These include (1) a thin film polarizers of obliquely codeposited th in films; (2) a giant magnetoresistive (GMR) sensors for speed sensors ; and (3) structural and optical properties of organic/inorganic super lattices. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.