Langmuir probe for electro-cyclotron-resonance plasmas

The technology of growing a thin epitaxial film on a substrate has been researched and employed in the semiconductor industry for decades. Recently, the technique of using an electron-cyclotron-resonance plasma to deposit a thin film on the substrate has been developed which has the advantage of easily controlling the electron density and the film thickness. Therefore, many efforts are devoted to the research of confining the plasma and finding correlations between the plasma parameters and the processing system parameters.

A Langmuir probe has been used for the measurement of electron density and temperature in an ERC plasma. The theory of the probe operation is discussed in the presence of the magnetic and electric fields. The design and construction of the probe system, as well as the operation of the system, are described.