Surface cleaning mechanisms utilizing VUV radiation in oxygen containing gaseous environments

摘要

This article presents results on surface cleaning with VUV radiation from dielectric barrier discharge-driven Xe_2~* excimer VUV light sources at 172 nm in oxygen-containing gases. The basic mechanism for the generation of excited rare gas and rare gas/halogen dimers in dielectric barrier discharges is described, which is utilized to generate powerful and efficient, incoherent excimer (V)UV light sources. After a brief discussion of the formation of atomic oxygen and ozone by irradiation of molecular oxygen with VUV light at 172 nm, the dominant chemical reaction scheme in the advanced oxidation of hydrocarbons on surfaces is outlined. Following to a comparison of the reaction rates of atomic oxygen and ozone with hydrocarbons, as well as a discussion of the mean free pathlength of atomic oxygen at or near atmospheric pressure, results on surface cleaning in air with VUV radiation at 172 nm will be presented.