(on flux and ion power losses at the electrode rf discharge

V. A. Godyak, R. B. Piejak, and B. M. Alexandrovich GTE Laboratories Incorporated, Waltham, Massachusetts02254

sheaths in a symmetrical

(Received 3 1 October 1990; accepted for publication 7 December 1990) Ion flux and ion acceleration power have been measured at the electrode sheath in a capacitively coupled argon discharge driven at 13.56 MHz. Two independent methods have been used to evaluate the ion power. One method is based on measuring the ion current to an rf electrode and the dc component of the rf sheath voltage. The other method is based on measuring the discharge power as a function of the total discharge current. Measurements were performed at gas pressures between 3 mTorr and 3 Torr and at discharge powers between 10e2 and lo2 W. Over the entire range of operation the ratio of the ion to discharge current varied between 1% and 3%, whereas the percentage of the ion power loss was between a fraction of a percent and 95% depending upon the total discharge power. The series equivalent resistance corresponding to the ion power loss was found experimentally and corresponds well with predictions based on a dynamic sheath model.

1. INTRODUCTION The ion flux to the discharge electrodes or to a dielectric wall between rf electrodes and an rf plasma is a subject of great concern in any capacitive (E-type) discharge application. Energetic ion bombardment of the substrate surface is a basic physical phenomenon that occurs in rf discharges, making them very useful as plasma processing devices. On the other hand, ion bombardment is undesireable in plasma source devices, such as rf-pumped lasers and rf incoherent light sources, because it results in a useless waste of power and an increased erosion at the rf electrodes or containing walls. For a steady-state low-pressure gas discharge, the ion current to the wall and the electrodes is mainly governed by the ionization rate in the plasma volume. The existence of sheaths along the plasma boundaries provides ion acceleration toward the wall and the negatively charged electrodes. For the positive column of a dc discharge, the ion acceleration power is usually a small fraction of the total discharge power. But for rf discharges and for short dc glow discharges, the ion acceleration power can be a considerable part of the total discharge power. The ion acceleration power Pi for a symmetric parallelplate rf discharge has been found to be as follows P2: Pi=21i( V& - Vu), (1)

Pi/P,=

(~/ti)~3~,/2dv,

a I/pdti2,

(2)

where w, and w are the electron plasma frequency and driving frequency, respectively, ven is the electron-neutral collision frequency, d is the plasma half-width, I is the discharge current (I a @a), and p is the gas pressure. An estimation using Eq. (2) shows that for values of discharge parameters normally encountered in practice, the ratio of Pi/P, can range from Pi/P, ( 1 t0 Pi/P, ) 1. In this work the dc ion current Ii and the ion acceleration power to the rf electrode is found over a wide range of discharge parameters for a symmetrically driven rf discharge in argon at 13.56 MHz. Two independent methods where used to determine the ion acceleration power. In one method, based on the direct measurements of the ion current and dc sheath voltage, Pi is calculated according to Eq. ( 1). In the other method, the total discharge power P is measured as a function of the discharge current, and Pp and Pi were determined on the basis of their respective dependence on I. The values of the ion power found by the two methods are in reasonable agreement and they correspond fairly well to the predictions of the dynamic rf sheath model in Ref. 4. II. EXPERIMENTAL TECHNIQUE AND RESULTS

where Ii is the ion current injected from the plasma into each rf sheath, V,, is the dc component of the rf sheath voltage, V, = ;T, ln(M/2Pm) is the floating sheath voltage, T, is the electron temperature in volts, and M and m are the ion and electron mass, respectively. Implicit in Eq. ( 1) is that Pi is due only to the rf power consumed by ions from the rf source. Assuming that ions are injected into the rf sheath with the ion sound speed v, = (eTJM) 1 2, the ratio between Pi and the power dissipated in electron heating of the plasma body Pp has been found in a homogeneous plasma to be3
3455 J. Appl. Phys. 69 (6), 15 March 1991

All measurements were performed in a parallel-plate argon discharge driven at 13.56 MHz. The experimental system is described in Ref. 5. The cylindrical discharge was axially confined by aluminum electrodes separated by 6.7 cm and radially confined with a glass tube having an inner diameter of 14.3 cm. The circuit used to measure ion current is shown schematically in Fig. 1. The dc ion current li( U) to the rf electrode was measured by applying a dc voltage across the rf electrodes [between terminals (a) and (b)] and recording the dc current flowing through the circuit. A typical dc current/voltage characteristic is shown in Fig. 2. It is very similar to a double-probe characteristic, being symmetric with respect to the applied dc volt@ 1991 American Institute of Physics 3455

0021-8979/91/063455-06$03.00

FIG. 1. Schematic diagram for ion current measurement.

1O'2

10.'

1 o"

10'

discharge

current (A)

i-url I

FIG. 3. Ion-to-discharge current.

current ratio as a function of the discharge

age U. However, it differs somewhat from a typical doubleprobe characteristic because the current generally falls off in the saturation region (instead of rising). Ii(U) decreased near saturation due to a decrease in rf discharge current (and plasma density) since the rf discharge voltage was fixed while the dc bias voltage was increased across the electrodes. The discharge current decreased because the sheath about the negatively biased electrode expanded with increasing bias, thus reducing the rf sheath capacitance and consequently increasing the discharge impedance. The sheath width in front of the positively biased rf electrode was virtually independent of the electrodes dc bias. Note that the sheath width could be easily observed through the glass wall that confines the

discharge radially. The undistorted value of the ion current to the rfelectrode, 1, was found by linear extrapolating the ion current to the zero-bias voltage (U = 0) as shown in Fig. 2. Another approach to obtaining an undistorted value for the ion current is to calculate a corrected ion current I?( U), taking into account the fall in the discharge current and assuming proportionality between the ion and discharge currents: I?( U) =Ii( U)I/Iby where I and Ib are rf discharge currents for the unbiased and biased discharge, respectively. The value of I?( U) found from the above formula is also shown in Fig. 2. The extrapolation of both curves IT(U) and I[( U) gives fairly close values for the undistorted ion current. It appears that IT(U) is less accurate than Ii(U) since to maintain the same value of discharge current one is forced to increase the rf discharge voltage (and the voltage across the sheath). Thus, Ii determined using the first method has been used throughout this paper to represent the ion current to the electrode. The discharge disturbence caused by the dc bias was found to be greatest at the lowest gas pressure (p = 3 mTorr) where dc biasing makes the rf discharge rather asymmetric. For this condition the rf sheath capacitance becomes comparable to the plasma-to-ground capacitance and the plasma parameters of the biased (asymmetric) discharge differ from that of a symmetric discharge with the same values of the discharge current (or driving rf voltage). The difference in the ion current obtained by the two methods can reach up to 50%. For this reason the accuracy in the ion current determination is essentially lower than that for the electrical discharge characteristics and is estimated to be within about 30%, being somewhat better for the higher gas pressures. The ratio Ii/I is shown in Fig. 3 as a function of disGodyak, Piejak, and Alexandrovich 3456

2.0

1.5 z.E E 1.0 2 2 0 -O 0.5

I?(U) H M xT /XT---/* <:I-I I I

Ii (U ---

i
8 I I

60 40 20 bias voltage (V)

FIG. 2. Measured electrode ion current vs dc bias voltage 27. The discharge conditions were p = 0.1 Torr and Z = 13 1 mA. The solid line is the dc current/voltage characteristic Z,( CZ), and circles are the corrected values of ion current p(U).

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charge current over a wide range of current and gas pressure. Figure 3 shows that Ii/I is nearly independent of gas pressure and weakly dependent on discharge current, increasing by a factor of 3 while the discharge current increased by 50 times. Having measured the dc voltage Ve between the rf electrode and a floating loop probe placed in the discharge midplane, V0 = I ,, - V,, one can calculate the values of the ion acceleration power P, using Eq. ( 1). At all gas pressures and for discharge voltages larger than 70 V (peak), the values of V0 were found to be about 40% of the applied rf voltage. This is in good agreement with calculations for collisionless and highly collisional rf sheaths.7 8 Another method to determine Pi is based on recognizing the different functional dependence of P,(I) and Pp( I). As has been shown, 4,9 the total discharge power can be represented as follows: P=Pp + Pi=i( VJ + R,hI ), (3)

1 o2

10S3

1Ci2 IO loo discharge current (A)

IO

where V,, is the ohmic (in phase with the current) part of the rf voltage drop across the bounded rf discharge plasma and is defined as VP = S 5 $Epo dx, where Epc is the effective (ohmic) plasma electric field, and Rsh is the equivalent series sheath resistance representing ion acceleration losses corresponding to the formula (4) The value VP includes collisional and stochastic electron heating and is rather constant over wide range of discharge current. Its constant nature is a consequence of ionization and energy balances in a weakly ionized gas discharge plasma. The sheath (ion loss) resistance Rsh is also almost constant and this follows from the linearity (to first order) of the I/V characteristic of symmetrical rf discharges.4 Thus, having different power laws for plasma (electron) losses and ion losses, linear and squared, respectively, one can separate these effects and determine the parameters V, and R,, from experimentally derived P-vs-Z measurements. The electrical discharge characteristics, such as the discharge current and voltage amplitudes I and V, and the discharge power P, were also measured using the technique described in Refs. 5 and 10. The typical discharge power characteristics are given in Fig. 4. A different dependence of P(I) is evident for small and large currents. Specifically, P is nearly linear with I at small currents and it is nearly proportional to I2 at large currents, which corresponds well with formula (3). Linearly extrapolating from the logarithmic scale of Fig. 4 for the plasma power which corresponds to Pp = BZb (with B and b being constant for each gas pressure), one can find the ion power Pi as the difference Pi = P - P,,. It is clear that Pi found this way only has reasonable accuracy at high power. For low power an inaccuracy in the power measurement, which we estimate to be about 5%, can drastically increase the error in the determination of Pp For this reason we have retained only those calcu3457 J. Appl. Phys., Vol. 69, No. 6,15 March 1991

FIG. 4. Typical discharge power characteristics for 1.0 (0) and 0.01 (A) Torr. The plasma power extrapolation Pp = El is shown as a solid line for the p = 0.01 Torr.

lated values of Pi that are larger than 0.2P. For smaller Pit the uncertainty in Pi can reach more than 30%, making it meaningless. The ion acceleration power found by the two methods is given in Figs. 5-7 together with the total discharge power. From these figures it is evident that Pi can be fairly well represented by the expression Pi = CI (with C and c being constant for each gas pressure), and its values are close to those found from ion current measurements. III. SHEATH RESISTANCE AND COMPARISON THEORY WITH

It is convenient to account for the ion acceleration power by introducing a series equivalent sheath resistance

1 o2

10

10"

1o-2 1

1oe2

IO discharge

1 o current (A)

10

FIG. 5. The total power (A) and the ion power (0) found from the power characteristic and the ion power (0) found from ion current measurements for p = 0.01 Torr.

Godyak, Piejak, and Alexandrovich

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10

tz 8

$ loo B a

.$lO !! c 3 c

10-l

lo-2 lo-2 lo discharge 1 o current (A) 10

100L. lo 2

10-l discharge

1 o current (A)

10

FIG. 6. The total power (A) and the ion power (0) found from the power characteristic and the ion power (0) found from ion current measurements for p = 0.1 Torr.

FIG. 8. Sheath resistance vs discharge current found from power characteristic (open symbols) and those found from ion current measurements (closed symbols) for three gas pressures.

Rsh according to Eq. (4) since R,, depends only slightly on the discharge current and gas pressure.4 9 The values of the sheath resistance calculated using Eq. (4) and the data for Pi found by two different methods are given in Fig. 8. The pressure dependence of Rsh for discharge currents of 160 and 480 mA, corresponding to a current density of 1 and 3 mA/cm2, respectively, is shown in Fig. 9. Here also are given the theoretical dependence of R,,,(p) for the collisionless and the highly collisional rf sheath obtained from the following equation4: Rsh = 64m~,Q/Aw~, (5)

where ;1n is the electron Debye radius at the plasma-sheath boundary, V, is the t-f voltage drop across the two rf sheaths, ;li is the ion mean free path, and S,, is the capacitive sheath width (Se is close to the time-averaged sheath width). For the limiting cases of a collisionless sheath (a< 1) and highly collisional sheath (a> 1 ), the parameter Q does not depend on a and remains nearly constant over a wide range of V, (or I). The collisionless Q and the collisional Q found from Ref. 4 are 1.9 and 0.79, respectively. Thus, for low gas pressures (a(l), R shz 380us/Ao2, (7)

with A being the rf electrode area, v1 being the velocity of ions injected into the rf sheath, and u1 = [ eTJM( a = rild2;1, 1 + a) ] l, Q= T, V&/ V$h (6)

independent of plasma density (and discharge power or current). In the high-gas-pressure limit (a> I), R sh=: 160us/Aw2a 1 2, (8)

1 o*

3 ,I

9-T

1 o2

Follisionless * . . . .

limit collisional limit

* 160 mA
l

480 m A

loo lo-3 10 lo-* 10 discharge 1 o current (A) 10

IO-* lo gas pressure

loo (Torr)

10

FIG. 7. The total power (A) and the ion power (0) found from the power characteristic and the ion power (0) found from ion current measurements for p = 1.0 Torr. 3458

FIG. 9. Sheath resistance vs gas pressure. The closed (black) symbols represent experimental measurements. The horizontal line corresponds to the model for the collisionless limit. The two sloping lines corresponds to the model4 for highly collisional limit with I = 480 m A (upper line) and with 2 = 160 m A (lower line).

J. Appl. Phys., Vol. 69, No. 6,15 March 1991

Godyak, Piejak, and Alexandrovich

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and so it is dependent on plasma density and gas pressure. To find values of Rsh for high gas pressures, we estimated a from experimental data of the ion current density Ji = l/A using the expression, for the ion current density,4 Ji=en vp - 2, (9) .P P
B 2 10-l 3 E 2 .g ,o-2 & lo*

where nl is the plasma density at the plasma-sheath boundary. For CL>1, a= (nu,TJ16JJf)z 5, and from Eq. (S), we obtain /Aw2 (m,T,) R shz 16Ou,( 16J&) B a (p2/Ji) 5. (11) In calculating these expressions, Te = 3 V has been assumed over the entire pressure range and /zi has been found from data on ion drift velocity in argon in a strong electric field when the ion friction force is controlled by a chargeexchange process: /3,=4.2x 10e3 (cm Torr)/p (Torr). (12) (10)

1O 3 1o 3

10. lo* IO discharge current (A)

10

As one can see in Fig. 9, the experimental data of R,,(p) found from ion current measurements reasonably matches theoretical predictions for collisionless and highly collisional rf sheaths. Note that even for the lowest gas pressure (p = 0.003 Torr) the rf sheath cannot be considered as collisionless since for this case Sa z /zi = 1.4 cm. In contrast with theoretical prediction, Rsh seems to depend on discharge current (plasma density) at low gas pressure, but not at high gas pressure. However, limited accuracy in Rsh together with small differences in Rsh obtained for different discharge current and assumption of the electron temperature independent of gas pressure and discharge current makes this finding controversial and dubious. IV. DISCUSSION The ratio of Ii/I in Fig. 3 demonstrates a slight dependence on current and no dependence on pressure at least within the accuracy of the determination of this ratio. The current dependence of Ii/I seems to correspond with Eq. (8) for a collisional rf sheath. This implies that Iian: and since I an, one should expect Ii/I a 14, which is close to the observed dependency in the experiment. What is unexpected is that the ratio Ii/Z does not depend on gas pressure. As one can show, Ii/Z=Ul/U, = (am/8M)2( 1 + o) - 2U~/U-,

FIG. 10. Ratio of ion power/plasma power as a function of the discharge current at three gas pressures. Discrete points correspond to the data obtained from ion current measurements. Lines corresponding to that found from power characteristics are approximated by the function ZP = CZ .

total discharge power, we can determine the ion-to-plasma power ratio Pi/P, for the conditions of our experiment, and the result is shown in Fig. 10 for different gas pressures. Here, the straight lines represent P/P,, found from the power characteristics using a power-law approximation Pi/P,= (C/B)I b.

where u[ and u, are the thermal electron mean velocity and the oscillatory drift velocity of electrons at the plasmasheath boundary. The ratio UJU- usually rises with gas pressure, whereas (1 f CY)- 2 drops with gas pressure. Thus, Ii/I ccconst found in our experiment may be the result of these opposing trends, although it is surprising that this should occur over such a large range of gas pressure. An interesting question that has been widely discussed recently is the amount of rf power that goes to plasma electrons and that which goes into acceleration of ions in the rf sheath. Having found the ion acceleration power and
3459 J. Appl. Phys., Vol. 69, No. 6,15 March 1991

The lines are extended to the minimal and maximal values of the working discharge currents to show the range of the Pi/Pp ratio corresponding to our experiments. The points in Fig. 10 represent the Pi/Pp ratio found from ion current measurements using for Pp the approximation P,, = Bib, which follows from the power characteristic measurements. The data given in Fig. 10 demonstrates a very wide range of magnitude of Pi/P, depending on the gas pressure and discharge current (or power). For low gas pressure (p = 10 mTorr), the ion to plasma power ratio ranges between 2 X 10 - 3 and 20. This wide range of Pi/Pp is a consequence of the fact that for discharges at low gas pressure the magnitude of VP is minimal, while the discharge impedance and likewise the rf and dc voltages across the rf sheath are maximal for the same value of discharge current (or power). Note that Pp a VP, while the ion acceleration voltage Vacc V. As one can see in Fig. 10, Pi/P, grows with discharge current somewhat faster than linearly as it follows from formula (2). The linear dependence Pi/P,(I) in Eq. (2) is the consequence of assuming (wrongly) that u, = u, for a collisional sheath. Incorporating ( 1 ), (6) and (9)) we obtain
Pi=2AetZlUsVo(

1 + CX)- 2 (13)

= 32a~,Q1~/Aw~( 1 + a) 2,

and together with the expression for Pp = Vd/2, we obtain

Godyak, Piejak, and Alexandrovich 3459

Pi/P,=64~JusQ/Vp(

1 +

a) 2~2-Rs,I/Vp

(14)

Since the product Vp( 1 + CZ)~ is falling with discharge current ( Rsh/Vp is rising), the ratio Pi/P, grows more steeply than linearly with increasing current. Equation (14) is convenient for estimation of Pi/Pp since it involves discharge parameters (J and V,), which are easily found in experiment. As for the ion sound speed u,aM2 and the factor ( 1 + a) 2, they are weakly dependent on discharge conditions (i.e., power and gas pressure). The relation V,apd exists for discharges with collisionally dominated electron heating (in argon dischargesI for pd > 0.2 Torr cm). For low pd when stochastic electron heating dominates,13 V, z const, independent of either p and d. Generally, the rf power redistribution between the plasma (electron heating) and the sheaths (ion acceleration) is sensitive to the driving frequency (Pi/Pp a w - 2). In rf discharge applications where gas constituents, gas pressure, and discharge power (plasma density) are predetermined to optimize a chosen process, a change in 02d can effectively control the ratio Pi/P, The ion acceleration into the rf electrode sheaths affects the rf discharge power factor cos 4 (see Ref. 14) such that
COS 4

The discussion up to here has pertained to discharges without y processes. If such processes occur, the ratio Pi/P, should increase since VP would fall drastically due to intensive ionization by y electrons, accompanied with a growth in the plasma conductivity and a fall in the plasma electric field.15 As shown in Ref. 15, for rf discharges in the y regime almost all rf power goes into ion acceleration since usually the electron/ion emission coefficient y( 1. At the condition of our experiment forp = 0.3 and 1 Torr, we could see a smooth transition of the rf discharge in the y regime at the highest discharge current, accompanied by a change in the discharge luminosity, although there was no appreciable change in discharge current/voltage characteristics.
J. H. Keller and W. B. Pennebaker, IBM J. Res. Rev. 23, 3 ( 1979). V. A. Godyak and Z. Kh. Ganna, Fix. Plasmy 6, 783 (1980) [Sov. J. Plasma Phys. 6, 372 (1980)]. V. A. Godyak, Soviet Radio Frequency Discharge Research (Delphic Associates, Inc., Falls Church VA, 1986), p. 43. 4V. A. Godyak and N. Stemberg, Phys. Rev. A 42, 2299 ( 1990). 5V. A. Godyak, R. B. Piejak, and B. M. Alexandrovich, Rev. Sci. Instrum. 61, 2401 (1990). V. A. Godyak and R. B. Piejak, J. Appl. Phys. 68, 3157 ( 1990). M. A. Lieberman, IEEE Trans. Plasma Sci. PS-16, 638 (1988). M. A. Lieberman, IEEE Trans. Plasma Sci. PS-17, 338 ( 1989). C. Beneking, in Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium on the Science and Technology of Light Sources, York, 1989, edited by R. Devonshire, J. Meads, and D. 0. Wharmby (University of Sheffield, Sheffield, 1989). V. A. Godyak and R. B. Piejak, J. Vat. Sci. Technol. A 8,3833 (1990). F J Smith, E. A. Mason, and R. J. Munn, Chem. Phys. 42, 1334 (1985). *V A. Godyak and R. B. Piejak, Phys. Rev. Lett. 65, 996 (1990). V A. Godyak and 0. A. Popov, Fix. Plasmy 5, 400 ( 1979) [Sov. J. Plasma Phys. 5, 227 (1979)]. 14V A Godyak and R. B. Piejak, in Proceedings of the Tenth European Sectional Conference on Atomic and Molecular Physics of Ionized Gases, Orleans, France, 1990, edited by B. Dubreuil (European Physical Society, Orleans, 1990). 15V. A. Godyak and A. S. Khanneh, IEEE Trans. Plasma Sci. PS-14, 1 I2 (1986).

= VJ V + 41i V()/I V,

(15)

where the first term corresponds to electron heating and the second to ion acceleration. cos 4 is maximal (cos 4 = 1) at the minimum maintenance voltage ( V -+ VP and V, + 0). In the opposite case, a high-voltage rf discharge ( V B V,), cos 4 is minimal and is governed by the ion acceleration process. It is of interest to note that in this regime cos 4 reaches a minimum, independent of the discharge power, cos $min = 41iVo/I V z 1.61/I. Our measurements (see Ref. 5) have confirmed a saturation in cos 4 at large discharge power.

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