Advantages and drawbacks of atmospheric plasma technology
H. Baránková and L. Bardos
Uppsala University, Angstrom Laboratory, Plasma Group, Box 534, 751 21 Uppsala, Sweden
Non-thermal plasma processing of substrates at atmospheric pressure represents a new trend
stimulated mainly by wish to decrease technology costs and to avoid expensive pumping systems.
However, even though recent atmospheric plasma systems are already sophisticated enough and
capable to create even large area plasma for industrial scale surface treatments, e.g. activations,
cleaning or coating, there are principal limitations where atmospheric systems cannot replace
low-pressure plasma methods. A simplest example is an absence of energetic ions for sputtering
and related PVD processes. Main coating regimes are therefore based on PE CVD. The
processing conditions for atmospheric plasma are rather different from vacuum systems,
including specific health risks. In many cases these conditions may increase final technology
costs substantially. In this presentation we summarize main principles, advantages and drawbacks
of the atmospheric plasma for better understanding of capabilities and limits of the atmospheric
plasma processing technology.