thin film
noun
a film of material only a few microns thick, deposited on a substrate, as in the technology for making integrated circuits.
thin film
Americannoun
thin-film
British
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of thin film
First recorded in 1955–60
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
To strengthen the response, the researchers created a meta-surface from a thin film of amorphous silicon.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 18, 2026
The researchers produced the material using magnetron sputtering deposition, a process that applies a thin film to a surface.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 31, 2026
The team's superaerophobic three-dimensional nickel nanorods catalyst, with effective pore channels, demonstrated a remarkable 55-fold improvement in hydrogen production efficiency compared to an equivalent amount of nickel in a traditional thin film structure.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 22, 2024
The team landed on a very thin film device that helps restrain the crystal growth during assembly and printing.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 13, 2024
Sure enough, in the thin film of dust that had settled over it were dog tracks.
From "Old Yeller" by Fred Gipson
The company has been dogged by concerns over a lack of clarity into its operations, including its progress on building an operational foundry in Arizona to manufacture thin-film lithium niobate chips for quantum systems.
From Barron's ● May 11, 2026
The Chinese thin-film deposition equipment provider is poised to benefit from a strong memory expansion upcycle, the analysts say.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 29, 2026
Quantum Computing sees its thin-film lithium niobate chip foundry, which produces materials used in telecom hardware and photonic chips that power certain types of quantum systems, as a way to stand out from peers.
From Barron's ● Mar. 2, 2026
The research team reported successful manipulation of the quantum-metric structure at room temperature in a thin-film heterostructure comprising an exotic magnet, Mn3Sn, and a heavy metal, Pt.
From Science Daily ● Apr. 23, 2024
The thin-film nanocrystal scintillators, with a thickness of approximately 5 µm, exhibit high sensitivity that allows for a detection limit of 7 protons per second.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 1, 2024
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
