Journal ArticleDOI
Standing wave and skin effects in large-area, high-frequency capacitive discharges
TLDR
In this paper, an electromagnetic theory is developed for a discharge having two plates of radius R and separation 2l, which accounts for the propagation of surface and evanescent waves from the discharge edge into the center and the role of capacitive and inductive fields in driving the power absorption.Abstract:
Large-area capacitive discharges driven at frequencies higher than the usual industrial frequency of 13.56 MHz have attracted recent interest for materials etching and thin film deposition on large-area substrates. Standing wave and skin effects can be important limitations for plasma processing uniformity, which cannot be described by conventional electrostatic theory. An electromagnetic theory is developed for a discharge having two plates of radius R and separation 2l, which accounts for the propagation of surface and evanescent waves from the discharge edge into the centre and the role of capacitive and inductive fields in driving the power absorption. Examples of discharge fields are given having substantial standing wave and/or skin effects. The conditions for a uniform discharge without significant standing wave and skin effects are found to be, respectively, λ0>>2.6(l/s)1/2R and δ>>0.45(dR)1/2, where λ0 is the free space wavelength, s is the sheath width, δ = c/ωp is the collisionless skin depth, with c the speed of light and ωp the plasma frequency, and d = l-s is the plasma half-width. Taking the equality for these conditions for a discharge radius of 50 cm, plate separation of 4 cm, and sheath width of 2 mm, there is a substantial skin effect for plasma densities 1010 cm-3, and there is a substantial standing wave effect for frequencies f70 MHz.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
The 2012 Plasma Roadmap
Seiji Samukawa,Masaru Hori,Shahid Rauf,Kunihide Tachibana,Peter Bruggeman,Gerrit Kroesen,J. Christopher Whitehead,Anthony B. Murphy,Alexander Gutsol,Svetlana Starikovskaia,Uwe Kortshagen,Jean-Pierre Boeuf,Timothy John Sommerer,Mark J. Kushner,Uwe Czarnetzki,Nigel J. Mason +15 more
TL;DR: The 2012 plasma road map as mentioned in this paper provides guidance to the field by reviewing the major challenges of low-temperature plasma physics and their many sub-fields, as well as a review of the current state of the art in the field.
Patent
Plasma uniformity control by gas diffuser hole design
Soo Young Choi,John M. White,Qunhua Wang,Li Hou,Ki Woon Kim,Shinichi Kurita,Tae Kyung Won,Suhail Anwar,Beom Soo Park,Robin L. Tiner +9 more
TL;DR: In this paper, a gas diffuser plate for distributing gas in a processing chamber is described, which includes a diffuser with an upstream side and a downstream side, and a plurality of gas passages passing between the upstream and downstream sides of the diffuser.
Patent
Method of controlling the film properties of PECVD-deposited thin films
TL;DR: In this article, a combination of PECVD deposition process parameters was used to control surface standing wave effects which affect deposited film thickness uniformity and physical property uniformity, and a gas diffusion plate design was developed to assist in the control of plasma density to be symmetrical or asymmetrical over a substrate surface during film deposition.
Patent
Plasma uniformity control by gas diffuser curvature
TL;DR: In this paper, a gas distribution assembly for a plasma processing chamber comprises a diffuser plate with gas passages passing between its upstream and downstream sides and hollow cathode cavities at the downstream side of the gas passages.
Journal ArticleDOI
Plasma processing of low-k dielectrics
Mikhail R. Baklanov,Jean-Francois de Marneffe,Denis Shamiryan,Adam Urbanowicz,Hualiang Shi,Tatyana Rakhimova,Huai Huang,Paul S. Ho +7 more
TL;DR: In this article, an in-depth overview of the present status and novel developments in the field of plasma processing of low dielectric constant (low-k) materials developed for advanced interconnects in ULSI technology is presented.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Plasma sources based on the propagation of electromagnetic surface waves
Michel Moisan,Z. Zakrzewski +1 more
TL;DR: In this article, the physical principles of operation and the design of surface-wave plasma sources are discussed and a unified description of several compact, efficient, and easy to operate launchers specifically intended for plasma generation that have been developed over the past fifteen years.
Journal ArticleDOI
Analytical solution for capacitive RF sheath
TL;DR: In this paper, a self-consistent solution for the dynamics of a high voltage, capacitive radio frequency (RF) sheath driven by a sinusoidal current source is obtained under the assumptions of time-independent, collisionless ion motion and inertialess electrons.
Journal ArticleDOI
Functional separation of biasing and sustaining voltages in two-frequency capacitively coupled plasma
TL;DR: In this article, the authors measured the space profiles of the net excitation rate of Ar(3p5) for a two-frequency capacitively coupled plasma as a representation of a typical oxide etcher.
Journal Article
Functional separation of biasing and sustaining voltages in two-frequency capacitively coupled plasma
TL;DR: It was shown that the effect of the voltage becomes significantly smaller as the sustaining voltage is changed from high frequency, 13.56 MHz, to very high frequency (VHF), 100 MHz, and it even disappears for pulsed operation in mixtures.
Journal ArticleDOI
Dual excitation reactive ion etcher for low energy plasma processing
TL;DR: In this paper, the influence of the excitation frequency in parallel plate cathode-coupling equipment has been investigated and it was found that the self-bias voltage of the cathode becomes a logarithmic function of excitation frequencies in two distinct regions.