Thin Solid Films 506 507 (2006) 436 439

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Characteristics of a micro-plasma produced by atmospheric pressure

RF impulse discharge using coaxial micro-electrode
Yasuhiro Tanaka, Satoru Iizuka *
Department of Electrical Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Aoba 05, Aramaki, Aobaku, Senndai 980-8579, Japan
Available online 4 October 2005

Abstract
In order to achieve inner wall surface treatment of glass tube of micrometer and gas decomposition flowing through a small diameter glass
tube, a micro-plasma is useful. We have developed a new method for producing a micro-plasma in order to apply to the surface treatment and
micro-plasma CVD on the inner wall surface of a micro-glass tube at atmospheric pressure. The plasma is produced by using a coaxial microelectrode to which RF impulse is applied. We have elucidated fundamental characteristics of the discharge and optimized the electrode
configuration. We find that breakdown voltage can be decreased with a decrease in the diameter of the inner electrode. We also clarified the
effect of gas species and flow rate on the discharge.
D 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Micro-plasma; Atmospheric pressure discharge; RF impulse discharge

1. Introduction
Recently, plasma technology is one of the key tools in
various fields such as the environment, medical treatment,
various materials processing, decompositions of exhaust
gas, and ozone processing [1]. The plasma is also useful in
light source technology such as a plasma display and a back
light source of liquid-crystal display. In the plasma display
technology, it is required to produce a micro-plasma
efficiently. Moreover, in the ultra-fine processing technology, it will be necessary to produce small size plasma [2].
Therefore, the research on the micro-plasma is quite
important for establishing small size processing.
Atmospheric pressure plasmas provide several advantages compared to the well-established low-pressure plasmas. For the operation of atmospheric pressure plasmas, no
vacuum equipment is required, thus they can be operated at
very low costs and may easily be integrated into in-line
processes. Because of short electron mean free path less
than approximately 0.1 mm, atmospheric pressure dis-

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +81 22 795 7113; fax: +81 22 263 9374.
E-mail address: iizuka@ecei.tohoku.ac.jp (S. Iizuka).
0040-6090/$ - see front matter D 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.tsf.2005.08.034

charges can be sustained in very tiny space of micrometer

[2,3]. The technique is very useful not only for surface
treatments and film depositions but also for the process of
samples such as biomaterials which cannot be carried out in
low-pressure plasma [4].
By using the discharge at atmospheric pressure, it is quite
easy to imagine from the Paschens law the production of a
micro-plasma of the order of micrometer. Although the
definition of micro-plasma is ambiguous, its size may
extend to several hundred micrometers. The micro-plasma is
quite useful to carry out the surface treatment of small glass
tubes and gas decomposition flowing through small
diameter glass tubes [1,4 7]. Therefore, it is important to
establish the method for producing a uniform micro-plasma
inside the small glass tube. The method employed here is
quite different from the other conventional RF atmospheric
pressure discharges performed by continuous waveform
voltage [7 9]. We have developed a new method for
producing a micro-plasma in a small glass tube by using
impulse RF discharge with pulse width of 10 As controlled
by the pulse amplitude and the pulse repetition frequency. In
this work, we report the characteristics of micro-plasmas
produced by atmospheric pressure RF impulse discharge
using a coaxial microelectrode.

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437

2. Experimental
Experimental setup consists of a glass tube, inner and
outer electrodes as shown in Fig. 1. Inner diameter of glass
tube is 800 Am. Diameter of the inner electrode is varied in
the range within 700 Am and that of the outer one is also
varied in the range of 1 3 mm. The shape of the inner
electrode has two types, i.e. rod-type and tube-type. In order
to apply our micro-discharge system to the actual CVD
processing in small glass tubes, the material gas has to be
supplied either from the inside of the inner tube electrode or
from the space between the glass and the inner rod
electrode. For this reason we have investigated the
characteristics of the discharge using the tube- and rod-type
inner electrodes. The outer electrode is grounded, while RF
impulse with pulse width of 10 As and variable repetition
period of 0.1 1.0 kHz is applied to the inner electrode.
Usually, the repetition frequency is fixed at 3.5 kHz.
In order to produce a plasma only inside the glass tube at
low applied voltage we investigate the characteristics of
plasma discharge by changing the experimental conditions
such as distance between the electrodes, applied voltage,
shape of electrodes, and repeating frequency of RF impulse.
The electrode configuration is optimized to get a wide
voltage range of operation. We also investigate the influence
of gas species and flow rate on the discharge. Here, the gas
is supplied through the inside of the inner electrode.
Discharge structure is also observed by CCD cameras under
the different applied voltage.

3. Experimental results and discussions

3.1. Optimization of electrode configuration
With an increase in the amplitude of RF impulse voltage
V RF, we find that a weak discharge first starts near the inner
electrode at V RF = V IN. Here, in the following experiment,
we mainly measure this breakdown voltage V IN. Then, the
brightness of discharge is increased with an increase in V RF
and, as a result, a uniform glow plasma is produced only
inside the glass tube. However, if we further increase the
voltage V RF, there appears a breakdown outside the glass
tube at the voltage higher than V OUT (> V IN). The typical
cross-sectional images of the discharge for the cases of weak
discharge and uniform glow discharge are shown in Fig. 2.

Fig. 1. Discharge system with coaxial micro-electrode.

Fig. 2. The typical cross-sectional images of the discharge for the cases of
weak discharge and uniform glow discharge.

The discharge outside the glass tube is meaningless for the

processing inside the glass tube. Therefore, wide operation
voltage ranges (V OUT V IN) under the condition of low
breakdown voltage V IN is favorable for the inner glass tube
processing from a viewpoint of industrial application.
Fig. 3 shows the breakdown voltage as a function of
distance d between the electrodes for four cases of outer (1
mm and 3 mm) and inner (0.3 mm and 0.7 mm) electrode
diameters. With a decrease in the diameter of inner
electrode, we find that breakdown voltage can be also
decreased. This is considered to be due to an increase in the
electric field at the tip of the inner electrode. In this figure,
there are three discharge schemes. In the first discharge
scheme of 3 < d < 0 mm, the breakdown voltage
gradually increases with the distance d. This is considered
to be due to the gradual decrease in the overlapped surface
area of the electrodes with keeping the distance between the
surfaces of the electrodes constant. In the second discharge
scheme of 0 < d < 3 mm, the breakdown voltage rapidly
increases with an increase in the distance d according to the
Pachens law. In the third discharge scheme of 3 mm < d,
the breakdown voltage gradually increases again with the

Fig. 3. Breakdown voltage as a function of distance d between electrodes

with diameter of inner and outer electrode as a parameter. (Repeating
frequency of the RF impulse is 3.5 kHz.)

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Y. Tanaka, S. Iizuka / Thin Solid Films 506 507 (2006) 436 439

distance d. This might be because the discharge is gradually

turned to a surface discharge which breakdown voltage is
reduced from usual discharge in the gas. The values of V OUT
is about 4 kV for the inner electrode of 0.3 mm and the outer
electrode of 1 mm in diameter at d = 7 mm in Fig. 3.
We find that the outer electrode of 1 mm diameter has a
low breakdown voltage compared to that of 3 mm. This is
interpreted by the increase in the electric field at the same
applied voltage. By comparing these results, the breakdown
voltage of 0.3 mm diameter is lower than that of 0.7 mm.
From these results it is found that lower breakdown voltage
is realized in the electrode combination with the outer and
inner electrodes of 1.0 mm and 0.3 mm in diameter,
respectively.
In order to verify this experimental result, numerical
calculation on the electric field distribution is performed
using an axis-symmetric electrode configuration model. The
results under different conditions of inner electrode diameter
are shown in Fig. 4. The edge region of outer and inner
electrodes is treated as equi-potential surface of the
conductor electrodes. Here, contours of equi-strength of
electric field are plotted. We find that the electric field at the
tip of the inner electrode is rather strong. As shown by the
maximum of electric field plotted in upper right corner of
each figure, the strength of electric field is increased at the tip
of the inner electrode with a decrease in the diameter of inner
electrode. These numerical results are well consistent with
those in the experiment. Theoretical value of the electric field
strength necessary for ignition of discharge can be obtained
from the Townsends relation a = pAexp( Cp/E) with
Townsends first ionization coefficient a [10]. We solve this
equation to obtain E = 2.77  105 [V/cm] for C = 36 500 V/mTorr at p = 760 Torr. On the other hand, from our numerical
calculation the electric field at the tip is given by
E = 3.06  105 [V/cm] for d = 0.2 [cm] and V = 2.5 kV. From
the above comparison the electric filed observed in the

Fig. 4. The numerical calculation of electric field distribution [V/m] for the
same voltage applied (10 kV) for inner electrode diameters (a) 0.6 mm and
(b) 0.3 mm.

Fig. 5. Breakdown voltage as a function of distance d between electrodes

with the shape of inner electrode as a parameter.

experiment is quite reasonable. Therefore, the ionization was

mainly caused by electric field emission from the inner
electrode.
Next, we investigate the effect of the shape of inner
electrode on the discharge. Fig. 5 shows the breakdown
voltage as a function of distance d between the electrodes

Fig. 6. The breakdown voltage as a function of (a) gas pressure and (b) gas
flow rate. (Outer electrode diameter is 1 mm and repeating frequency of the
RF impulse is 3.5 kHz).

Y. Tanaka, S. Iizuka / Thin Solid Films 506 507 (2006) 436 439

for four cases of inner electrode shapes (tube and rod) and
inner electrode diameters (0.3 mm and 0.7 mm). Even when
the shape of inner electrode is changed, only little difference
appears between the breakdown voltages for the rod and
tube types. This implied the importance of the electric field
at the outer edge of the inner electrode.

439

flow-rate operation in which one pair of inner and outer

electrodes is mechanically swept along the tube to move the
local discharge region in the axial direction for the uniform
inner wall processing.

4. Summary
3.2. Characteristics of the discharge
The property of the discharge may be affected by species
and flow rate of working gas flowing through the microglass tube. Therefore, we intend to investigate the influence
of species and flow rate of working gas on the discharge.
Here, we employ Ar and N2 as dilution gas and compare the
effects on the discharge. Here, we used an outer electrode of
1 mm in diameter at the electrode distance of 7 mm. N2 is
quite popular for nitride processing.
Fig. 6(a) shows the breakdown voltage as a function of
gas pressure for four cases of inner electrode diameters (0.4
mm and 0.7 mm) and gas species (Ar and N2). In all cases,
the breakdown voltage is gradually increased with an
increase in the gas pressure. In case of Ar, the breakdown
voltage is lower than that of N2 in the whole pressure range.
Moreover, almost no difference appears between the breakdown voltages for the inner electrodes of 0.4 mm and 0.7
mm in diameter. Since Ar is mono-atom, there is little
dissociation and excitation loss. This may cause lower
breakdown voltage compared to that of N2.
The breakdown voltage as a function of gas flow rate is
shown in Fig. 6(b) for four cases of inner electrode
diameters (0.4 mm and 0.7 mm) and gas species (Ar and
N2). Even when the gas flow rate is increased, the
breakdown voltage is almost constant in all cases. In our
case, the plasma produced locally at the tip of the inner
electrode is immediately lost on the inner wall surface of
glass tube. This particle loss might be quite dominant.
Moreover, the gas flow velocity is less than 2.6 m/s and the
length of electrodes is longer than the interelectrode gap.
Therefore, the ignition voltage of the discharge is not so
influenced by the gas flow unless the gas flow rate is too
large [11]. In addition, a similar result has also been reported
[8]. This property is desirable in the practical application.
However, for a smaller long glass tube, the pressure gradient
along the tube will be serious in case of high flow-rate
operation. To avoid this problem we propose a low gas

We have developed a new method for producing a microplasma by using the coaxial micro-electrode system in order
to apply to the surface treatment and micro-plasma CVD on
the inner wall of a micro-glass tube at atmospheric pressure.
From the various situations of inner and outer electrodes of
the coaxial microelectrode system, it has been clarified that
the breakdown voltage decreases with an increase in the
strength of electric field at the tip of the inner electrode. It is
also clarified that the breakdown voltage of Ar is lower than
that of N2, and there is little difference between the
breakdown voltages against the inner electrode sizes. The
influence of gas flow-rate is also very small; therefore, the
breakdown voltage can be kept almost constant even when
the processing speed is further increased.

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