| AVS 57th International Symposium & Exhibition | |
| Plasma Science and Technology | Monday Sessions |
| Session PS2-MoA |
| Session: | Atmospheric Plasma Processing and Micro Plasmas |
| Presenter: | Z. Ouyang, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| Authors: | Z. Ouyang, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign V. Surla, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign S. Jung, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign M.J. Neumann, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign D.N. Ruzic, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
The Center for Plasma-Material Interactions (CPMI) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has developed large-scale microwave-induced atmospheric plasma sources for use in various manufacturing applications. The microwave source employed has a working frequency at 2.45 GHz, and a maximum input power of 6 kW. Plasma sources of three different configurations have been developed in order to tailor the plasma configuration to various specific applications. A cold plasma torch head has the ability to generate an atmospheric plasma with a temperature range from room temperature (20°C) to more than 1,000 °C. A thermal plasma torch has been developed such that the temperature range extends to 2,000 °C. A linear line source suitable for production line integration has the ability to sustain a 20-centimeter long atmospheric plasma. Various gas compositions (He, Ar, N2 and O2) are used to reveal the functionalizations of different radicals and particles. OES system has been used to analyze critical characteristics such as electron density (ne~1014cm-3) and temperature (Te~1eV), plasma temperature (Tg~300-2,000K) under different operating conditions and results of material processing correlated to those measurements so that a selectable and repeatable material process can be obtained. Hydrophilicity tests on polymer substrates reveal that the “cold” atmospheric plasma has the ability to modify the surface energy within seconds of exposure at a relatively low flux of incident particles, without deforming bulk material substrates; while the “thermal” atmospheric plasma is used to assist in Nd:YAG laser ablation (f=100Hz, Pav = 2.0W at 266 nm, 12.5W at 532nm, and 32.5W at 1064nm) of metal or ceramic materials, to provide a means to deposit high quality contamination free films on substrate with better lamination at a relatively higher deposition rate (~5,000 nm/min) in comparison to traditional PVD methods.