A Chip-Scale, Low Cost PVD System

Abstract

Standard physical vapor deposition systems are large, expensive, and slow. As part of an on-going effort to build a fab-on-a-chip, we have developed a chip-scale, low cost, fast physical vapor deposition system consisting of two MEMS devices: a chip-scale thermal evaporator and a mass sensor that serves as a film thickness monitor. Here, we demonstrate the functionality of both devices by depositing Pb thin-films. The thermal evaporator was made by fabless manufacturing using the SOIMUMPs processs (MEMSCAP, inc). It turns on in 1.46s and reaches deposition rates as high as 7.2 ˚ As−1 with ∼1mm separation from the target. The mass sensor is a re-purposed quartz oscillator (JTX210) that is commercially available for less than one dollar. Its resolution was measured to be 2.65fg or 7.79E-5 monolayers of Pb.