Electrical characterization of a capacitive rf plasma sheath.
The authors report on an experimental system designed to investigate and characterize capacitive radio frequency (rf) sheaths. An electrode mounted in an inductive plasma reactor and driven with separate rf and direct current (dc) power sources is used. The advantage of this design is that the electrode sheath is decoupled from the plasma parameters. This allows detailed investigation of the sheath with different bias conditions without perturbing the bulk plasma parameters. Power coupled to ions and electrons through the sheath, at low pressure, is investigated and a method to determine the electron conduction current to the electrode, using the external dc bias, is presented.
Gahan
D
D
National Center for Plasma Science and Technology, School of Physical Sciences, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, Ireland. david.gahan@dcu.ie
Hopkins
M B
MB
D025802:Electric Capacitance; D004566:Electrodes; D004583:Electrons; D007477:Ions; D011312:Pressure
D007477:Ions