Plasma Cleaners (Tabletop & Large Chamber Models)
SAMCO Inc. > Cleaning Systems > Direct Plasma Cleaners
Plasma cleaning is one of the popular methods for surface cleaning of substrates in material research and device fabrication.
Samco plasma cleaners can be used for both R&D and production.
Our tabletop plasma cleaners have small footprint and are capable of batch processing of samples/wafers using multiple shelves.
H2O-based plasma cleaner offers unique process solutions of polymer surface treatment/bonding and copper/silver electrode cleaning.
Our large-chamber or magazine-to-magazine plasma cleaners are suitable for back-end cleaning process in device fabrication.
Tabletop Plasma Cleaners
The PC-300 and PC-1100 are tabletop plasma cleaning systems using parallel-plate direct plasma.
The systems can be used to clean organic and inorganic contamination from the surface of samples such as plastic packages, LCD substrates, multi-chip modules and hybrid ICs. Other applications include photoresist ashing, ink removal, surface activation and wettability improvement.
The PC-300 and PC-1100 are fully automatic systems with a touch panel. The process chamber enables the user to install multiple sample shelves, and the high degree of flexibility in configuration supports batch processing of a wide degree of products from small electronic components to larger substrates.
H2O-based Plasma Cleaner
The AQ-2000 is a plasma cleaner specially designed for Aqua Plasma treatment which uses H2O as process gas.
The system is capable of polymer surface treatment and bonding for microfluidics fabrication. Furthermore, the system offers metal surface cleaning without surface oxidation and redeposition which are typical process challenges in conventional O2 or Ar plasma treatment. The unique process is suitable for copper/silver leadframe and electrode cleaning in microelectronics packaging.
The system is equipped with multiple shelves for batch plasma processing, and is capable of plasma treatment of various size and number of samples.
Process Examples
Plasma Surface Modification of Various Materials
Samco plasma cleaners are suitable for plasma surface modification. Various materials such as silicon, glass, metals and polymers can be processed for wettability control. Polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) samples were processed using a plasma cleaner and characterized with water contact angle. The samples showed hydrophilic surface after the plasma processing. This surface modification process enhances adhesion of materials, and some customers use this process for bonding of samples in microfluidic device fabrication. Typical material combination of this application is Polydimethyl siloxane (PDMS) and glass. Easy-to-use touch screen of our plasma cleaners enables one-button operation for plasma surface activation of the materials.
Do you need plasma treatment of non-flat samples? We’ve got you covered!
We offer plasma cleaning process solutions for inner-walls of 3D structures such as plastic and glass tubes.
Initial PMMA
Contact Angle : 76.8°
PMMA after Plasma Surface Modification
Contact Angle : 20.2°
Polymer/Glass and Polymer/Polymer Direct Bonding
Samco H2O-based plasma cleaner offers unique process solutions of polymer/glass and polymer/polymer bonding in microfluidics fabrication. The process is specially developed by Samco and called as Aqua Plasma. Unlike VUV irradiation which is a conventional fabrication method, the Aqua Plasma process does not deteriorate auto-fluorescence of Cyclic Olefin Polymer (COP) for optical detection of molecules by fluorescence techniques. Furthermore, the plasma treatment process provides sufficient bonding strength without mechanical pressing and heating which can destroy fine micro-channel pattern.
Surface Reduction and Cleaning of Metals (Copper and Silver)
Copper and silver are getting more interest as materials of electrodes in microelectronics packaging in order to reduce material cost. Even though plasma cleaning using O2, Ar or H2 is one of the key processes in back-end community, there are some process challenges. O2 plasma causes surface oxidation and deteriorates brightness of leadframe. Ar sputtering causes redeposition of the metal particles. Furthermore, installation of H2 plasma process in production line is accompanied by potential safety issue.
As a process solution of metal surface cleaning in device packaging, Samco provides H2O-based plasma cleaning processes which called as Aqua Plasma. The picture on the right shows a copper-made coin before and after Aqua Plasma cleaning. Oxidized layer was removed using H2O-based plasma treatment which is specially developed by Samco. and the surface showed intrinsic color of copper. As seen in the picture, copper leadframe can be cleaned in Aqua Plasma without surface oxidation and redeposition of copper particles. This unique process solution is exclusive for Samco H2O-based plasma cleaner AQ-2000.
Copper Coin before/after Aqua Plasma
Testimonial
SAMCO plasma cleaners are used for device fabrication and material processing at nanofabrication facilities including
National Tsing Hua University
