Impacts of Plasma Fluctuations on Growth of Nano-Particles in Reactive Plasmas

摘要

We have studied impacts of plasma fluctuations on growth of nano-particles in capacitively-coupled rf discharges using an amplitude modulation (AM) of rf discharge voltage, by a two-dimensional laser-light scattering method. Nano-particles grow slower with increasing the AM level. 30% AM level leads to 300% increase in their density and >20% decrease in their size. The following mechanism is proposed; AM brings about an increase in the nucleation density of nano-particles. Then the radial flux to a nano-particle decreases, which leads to the slower nano-particle growth.