Mist Vapor Deposition Device

MVD Final Project Presentation

Contents

1 Project Overview
The development of new materials for use in electrical engineering is becoming increasingly important as the field pushes current technologies and techniques to their limits. The discovery and implementation of new materials allows these limits to be expanded and for innovation to continue. One problem with the research of new materials, however, is the time it takes to explore their usefulness in a given setting. This makes the development of new creation techniques for to-be-tested materials incredibly valuable. The quicker that the viability of a material can be determined, the quicker new materials can be developed. The purpose of our project is to create a device that will help facilitate faster development.

Mist Vapor Deposition (MVD) is a process by which a thin-film solution is deposited, in vapor form, on a silicon wafer. The deposit is then solidified via an annealing step, which finalizes it by baking off the solvent in the vapor. These devices generally cost upward of a hundred thousand dollars. The purpose of this project is to create, under the guidance of Development Engineer Chris Tasker, an inexpensive MVD device that could be scaled up in size as required by industry. Some of Chris Tasker’s unique design ideas will ideally allow the machine to be relatively low-cost, and the conjunctive use of the machine with experimental solution-suspended thin films developed by Oregon State University’s Chemistry Department will facilitate fast deposition and testing.

Our device will consist of three stations with a rotational shutter. The shutter will contain a wafer and will move between the three stations so that the wafer is only exposed to a single chamber at a time. In the first chamber, we will use an ultrasonic nebulizer to create a mist out of a solution containing the material intended for deposition. This mist will fill the chamber, creating a fog of vapor that will deposit on the surface of the wafer. The wafer will then be moved to the next station, where a heat lamp above the wafer will bake off the solvent leaving behind a thin film of solute. Lastly, the wafer will move to a cooling station where the wafer will be allowed to return to near-room temperature. This will insure that the solvent will not not bake off in the misting chamber due to ambient heat retained by the wafer. This process will be repeated several times in order to build up the film's thickness as required.

Minimum Requirements

• The nebulizer will create a mist to be deposited on the wafer
• The motor controlling the shutter will have controllable translation speed
• The motor controlling the shutter will have controllable dwell time over each chamber
• The shutter will be made of nonreactive materials in order to prevent solute buildup
• The heat lamp will have a controllable temperature output
• The heat lamp will have uniform temperature distribution on the wafer
• The wafer will be returned to an adequate deposition temperature before subsequent coating

2 Background Research
3 System Requirements and Desired Features
4 Design Solutions
5 Top Level Block Design

5.1 Nebulizer, Mist Chamber
5.2 Heat Lamp, Baking Chamber
5.3 Motor, Shutter Control
5.4 Rotational Sliding Shutter

6 Testing
7 Project Timeline
8 System Test Evidence
9 Expo Materials

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Final Presentation Video

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Team Members

(Left to right)
Brian Bickford - email
Nick Landau - email
Maria Ovsyankina - email
Sponsor/Mentor - Chris Tasker

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Responsibilities Contract (pdf)

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References

[1] References go here