PLAD: Facilities

Experimental facilities

View of the deposition chamber for multilayer fabrication

View of the deposition chamber for in-situ diagnostics (equipped with TOFMS)

Main experimental facilities available in the laboratory are:

an excimer laser LambdaPhysik EMG101MSC operated with XeCl mixture (308 nm, 120 mJ, 16 ns);
a deposition chamber (base pressure ~ 10^-8mbar) equipped with a multitarget holder for sequential ablation of up to 4 different targets and a stainless steel substrate heater (T_max 900 °C in oxygen atmosphere (at p(O₂) around 0.4 mbar), stability 1 °C;
a deposition chamber equipped with in-situ diagnostics facilities;
in-situ diagnostics facilities including:

a J-Y HR640FSL monochromator with gateable OMA (PAR IRY 1000G/B/R) for time and space-resolved analysis of the plume optical emission;
a 70 cm home-made Time-Of-Flight Mass Spectrometer (TOFMS) with cw and pulsed operation for time and space-resolved analysis of the primary ion content of the plume;
a laser-diode based system for time and space-resolved optical absorption measurements of atomic and molecular oxygen during PLAD
various optical, electronics and optoelectronics devices and PC-controlled instrumentation for carrying out the diagnostics measurements.

Characterization of our thin films and multilayers is mostly based on collaborations we have with other groups operating in the field of materials science. Anyway, in our lab we can perform preliminary optical (space-resolved reflection and transmission meaurements) and electrical (four probe resistance vs temperature) analysis on our samples. In addition, we fully exploit the capabilities of the Scanning Probe Microscopy Laboratory of Prof. Maria Allegrini to investigate the morphology and the optical properties of our samples with a space resolution below the diffraction limit.