Application of Microplasmas to microelectromechanical systems and bio-microsystems

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

In the 21st century, nano/microtechnologies play indispensable roles in the progress of high technology industry as well as microelectronics did in the 20th century. In recent years, MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) are put to practical use in earnest in an industrial field such as automobiles and digital consumer electronics. Moreover, a rapid progress has been seen in the emerging technology called μTAS (micro total analysis system) or LOC (Lab-on-a-chip), which is an integrated system of miniaturized devices for chemical and/or biochemical analysis. We have been engaged in the application study of microplasma technologies to the field of high-value added microsystems such as MEMS or μTAS since we believe this strategy is promising for the future industrial success and scientific progress of microplasma technology.Our group developed on-chip microplasma jet sources for the portable analysis system and have demonstrated localized and ultrahigh-rate silicon wafer etching using Ar/SF_6 microplasma jets. Based on these studies, we recently developed a prototype of the scanning microplasma jet etcher (SMPJE), which is composed of an on-chip microplasma jet source and a numerically controlled scanner.