SBIR Phase II: Scalable Linear Ion Beam For Large Area Plasma Processing

这个小企业创新研究（SBIR）第二阶段项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力涉及从淋浴门到消费电子产品到窗户玻璃的一切。高质量薄膜的大规模沉积和精确的能量控制可以允许，例如，类金刚石碳（DLC）在玻璃上。玻璃上的DLC涂层可以防止淋浴门上的肥皂膜积聚，可以提高手机显示屏的抗刮伤性，并且可以降低节能窗户的成本。在制造过程中对能量的控制不仅会拓宽薄膜的制作范围；它将允许使用更多种类的基材。近年来，许多应用都是在有机太阳能电池和有机led等新材料上使用传统的无机涂层（如氧化硅）。这些有机材料在涂层过程中对降解表现出更大的敏感性。当工业界开始将这些创新推向市场时，这种离子束源可以为工业界提供一种具有能量控制水平的工具，使实验室结果能够转化为高产量、低成本的制造。提出的项目解决了在绝缘和/或精密基板上沉积先进薄膜的挑战。在实验室演示中，对沉积能量通量的控制已被证明是许多薄膜所必需的，包括类金刚石碳、硅和有机太阳能电池上的透明导电氧化物以及超薄银。一个可扩展的线性离子束溅射源将建立一个大规模的制造工具，薄膜限制在今天的小得多的规模。在阶段1中，演示了源的功能。第二阶段有两个主要组成部分：针对规模和可用性的硬件开发；特定商业应用的工艺开发。该公司将提供一个完全集成的控制系统和一个源，规模为2倍，专为制造而设计。工艺开发将考虑光束能量学和光束/目标/衬底的几何形状与薄膜和衬底特性的关系。对于DLC，这将侧重于摩擦学和光学特性。对于银，他们将测试超薄薄膜的连续性。透明导电氧化物（TCO）的工作将集中在电学性能和衬底影响上，特别是硅中的载流子寿命。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project touches upon everything from shower doors to consumer electronics to window glass. Deposition of high-quality thin films on a large scale with precise energy control can allow, for one example, diamond-like carbon (DLC) on glass. DLC coatings on glass can prevent soapy film build-up on shower doors, can improve the scratch resistance of mobile phone displays, and can reduce the cost of energy-conserving windows. The control of energy during fabrication processes won't just broaden what films can be made; it will allow the use of a greater variety of substrates. In recent years, a number of applications have utilized traditional inorganic coatings like silicon oxide on top of new materials like organic solar cells and organic LEDs. These organic materials show greater sensitivity to degradation during the coating processes. This ion beam source can give industry, as it begins to bring these innovations to market, a tool with the level of energy control that will allow lab results to translate to high yield, low cost manufacturing. The proposed project addresses the challenge of depositing advanced thin films on insulating and/or delicate substrates. Control of the deposition's energy flux has been shown in laboratory demonstrations to be required for many thin films including diamond-like carbon, transparent conductive oxides on silicon and organic solar cells, and ultra-thin silver. A scalable linear ion beam sputter source will establish a high-volume manufacturing tool for thin films limited today to much smaller scale. In Phase 1, the source's functionality was demonstrated. Phase 2 has two major components: hardware development for scale and usability; process development for specific commercial applications. The company will deliver a fully integrated control system and a source, scaled by 2x and designed for manufacture. Process development will consider beam energetics and geometry of beam/target/substrate relative to film and substrate properties. For DLC, this will focus on tribological and optical properties. For silver, they will test for continuity of ultra-thin films. Transparent Conducting Oxide (TCO) efforts will focus on electrical properties and substrate impacts, particularly carrier lifetime in silicon.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.