Pulsed Laser Deposition Systems (PLD)

UHV Systems > Thin Film Deposition Systems > PLD

Pulsed Laser Deposition is a particular PVD technique which consists of a high-power pulsed laser beam being focused on a target that is inside a vacuum chamber. The laser beam shoots at the target with a certain energy and at a certain frequency such that the target material is vaporised and forms a plasma plume. This plume contains exfoliated particles (atoms, molecules, ions, electrons) that are carried across vacuum from target to substrate and deposited on the substrate as a thin film. This process can be performed in a high vacuum environment or in an environment rich in background gases such as oxygen. In this sense, PLD allows for stoichiometric transferability of materials from target to the substrate, the precise chemical composition of a complex material can be reproduced in the deposited film. Furthermore, automatically switching back and forth between targets during growth allows for the growth of superlattice materials