Emission Spectroscopy Analysis of Carbonaceous
Molecules Involved In Dust Particle Growth by Plasma
Safa Labidi*1, Erik von Wahl2, Jean-François Lagrange3, Thomas Lecas1, Holger
Kersten2, Titaina Gibert1 , Maxime Mikikian1
1
GREMI, UMR7344 CNRS/Univ. Orléans, Orléans, France
University of Kiel, IEAP, Leibnitzstraße 11-19, D-24118 Kiel, Germany
3
GREMI, UMR7344 CNRS/Univ. Orléans, Bourges, France
2
Dusty plasmas [1] are found in many astrophysical environments such as comet tails,
planetary nebulae and rings or in fusion devices like the future ITER. In industrial and
laboratory reactors, these dust particles [2] become a huge problem, particularly in
microelectronics. However, these particles could be used in many industrial applications
related to nanotechnology. So it’s important to study the production of these solid particles.
In GREMI laboratory, several methods are used to create dust particles in a plasma. They
are mainly based on reactive gases or material sputtering. In this work, experiments are
performed in a capacitively-coupled RF discharge in the PKE-Nefedov reactor [3], where
dust particles are grown by sputtering a polymer layer in Ar or Kr plasmas. The polymer layer
is previously deposited on the electrodes. Dust particle growth is analyzed by using optical
emission spectroscopy in order to study more precisely the spatial and temporal evolutions of
the molecules involved in this process like: C2, CN, CH, CO. When dust particles are growing
in the plasma, a laser at 685 nm is also used to highlight their presence. Their localization is
determined by recording the scattered light with the spectrometer (Fig. 1). Other tools are
used to follow dust particle growth like a CCD camera (Fig. 2) and measurements of the
discharge current.
Figure 1: Light scattering at 685 nm is
used to determine the localization of
dust particles in the plasma
Figure 2: A CCD camera is used to
observe dust particles in the plasma
References:
[1] M. Mikikian, L. Couëdel, M. Cavarroc, Y. Tessier, L. Boufendi, Eur. Phys. J. Appl. Phys. 49, 13106
(2010)
[2] R.M. Roth, K.G. Spears, G.D. Stein, G. Wong, Appl. Phys. Lett 46, 253 (1985)
[3] M. Mikikian, L. Boufendi, A. Bouchoule, H.M. Thomas, G.E. Morfill, A.P. Nefedov, V.E. Fortov, the
PKE- Nefedov Team, New J. Phys. 5, 19 (2003)
[email protected]