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Technical services for industry

Thin films

Thin film synthesis with different techniques according to the material to be deposited.

-PLD (Pulsed Laser Deposition) physical vapor deposition technique that uses ultraviolet laser radiation to vaporize the material to be transferred. PLD is used for ceramic oxides. Allows the synthesis of uniform layers with a thickness below the micron.

Sputtering (cathodic pulverization) is used to deposit metals.  Sputtering is a physical process. The atoms are vaporized from a solid target with energetic ions.

We have currently two PLD configurations and one sputtering configuration. They are connected and different materials and techniques can be combined in the same sample.

-Metals vaporization: allows highly homogeneous coatings of gold (Au), chrome (Cr), aluminium (Al), titanium (Ti), silver (Ag) among others, and alloys. The thermal evaporation equipment works with high vacuum and can rotate the sample.

Equipment: Evaporation System-Auto 306 from Boc Edwards

-atomic layer deposition (ALD): the equipment offers an atomic control of the deposits producing high quality layers. This equipment is designed to deposit homogeneous coatings with a uniform thickness, even in pores, cracks and cavities.  ALD is based on the sequential pulse of specific precursor gases or vapours, every pulse creates a monoatomic layer. 

Equipment: Atomic Layer Deposition System Savannah from Cambridge Nano Tech

-Ion Milling / Sputtering / E.Beam from TSST: with this equipment we can do three processes: 

  •  Make samples thinner with argon (Ar) ion bombing.
  • Gold (Au), silver (Ag), platinum (Pt) and copper (Cu) deposition with sputtering with one inch diameter targets. 
  • Evaporation of metals with electron beam with two evaporation sources with controlled evaporation flow. The equipment has a rotatory sample-holder system. It is possible to evaporate metals and annealed the samples with oxygen pressures, with molybdenum (Mo) crucible and in rods from 2 to 6 mm in diameter.

-Spin coater: it is used for the deposition of layers in a highly rotating substrate. the speed and time can be adjusted to obtained the desired thickness of the layer, with a range of rotation speed from 1 to 8,000 rpm. 

Equipment: Spinner CZ-650 de Laurell Technologies. Model WS-650SZ-6NPP / LITE

-Dip Coater: the production of coatings and layers through dipping is one of the processes mostly used in industry and academy. the extraction speed of the substrate from the solution is controlled, which allows the control over the thickness of the deposited layer. The high precision engine the extraction speed, and therefore the thickness of the layer, can be controlled with high precision and reproducibility.

Our equipment (DipMaster 201 from Chemat TechInc) can use substrates up to 12"X12" and has a range of extraction speed from 0.5" to 4.0" per minute. We can control temperature with a maximum temperature  of 80ºC in the infrared oven. 

- Nanodip Coater: fabrication of thin films with wet deposition. The versatility and simplicity of our equipment make it ideal for the fabrication of different kinds of homogeneous films: sol-gel, polymeric layers, multilayer structures 

Some of the characteristics of our equipment   (Nano Dip Coater ND-DC from Nadetech) are:

  • Vertical movement of 150 mm
  • Precision of 0,1 microns
  •  Immersion speed range from 10 micorns to 2,000 microns per minute.
  • sample with a maximum weight of 1,000 g g.
  • Programmable immersion sequence

-Ink-jet Printer: one of the impression techniques mostly used in industry. The principle of this methodology is based on the deposition of ink on a substrate to create defined patterns with small individual ink droplets. 

La tinta líquida se almacena en un contenedor provisto de una boquilla piezoeléctrica que permite el paso de las gotas cuando se aplica un voltaje. El valor de este voltaje, la frecuencia y el tiempo de aplicación son parámetros clave para generar una caída definida de gotas de tinta con el objetivo de obtener una dispersión homogénea cuando llega a la superficie. Las propiedades físicas que dominan el comportamiento de la tinta, como la tensión superficial y la viscosidad, deben estudiarse cuidadosamente.

La impresora de inyección de tinta prototipo del ICMAB permite la impresión continua de tintas no conductoras para crear patrones definidos.