The Tergeo range of plasma cleaners are manufactured in the Silicon Valley by PIE Scientific LLC and were designed by the alumni of Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (Plasma Physics Group). These are the most advanced plasma cleaners in the world however are not the most expensive. Our systems are being used at Australian National Fabrication Facility (ANFF), Australian Institute for Bioengineering and NanoTechnology (AIBN), QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, WearOptimo, Institute for Molecular Bioscience, University of Queensland, Australian National University, Micreo L3 Harris, Defence Science & Technology Group, University of Adelaide, Curtin University, University of Western Australia and more.
Tergeo plasma cleaners have been sold to more than 30 countries. Worldwide customers include Harvard University, Caltech, UC-Berkeley, MIT, multiple Max Planck Institutes in Germany, and multiple CNRS Institutes in France, the University of British Columbia and McGill University in Canada, HHMI, NASA, NIH, NIST, Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon, Intel, Micron, Honeywell aerospace, Corning, Merck, Illumina, etc.
The Tergeo series tabletop plasma system includes the basic Tergeo, Tergeo-Plus, Tergeo-Pro, and Tergeo-EM, are state-of-the-art tabletop plasma cleaning and etching systems. Designed for research, development, and low-volume production, these systems are well received by academic and industrial customers for their versatility, reliability, and ease of use in various applications.
Learn about our in-situ vacuum chamber plasma cleaners
Key Features:
- Support wide range of process gases: Capable of creating plasma from oxygen, argon, nitrogen, hydrogen, CF4, SF6, ambient air, water vapor and other mixed gases. Support up to three process gasses at the same time. Ideal for a range of processes including photoresist ashing, descum, surface cleaning and activation, and cleaning before bonding.
- Fully automatic system design: MFC regulated gas flow control. Recipe-based operation. Fully automatic operation from vacuum pumping, gas delivery and pressure stabilization, plasma ignition, impedance matching, timer countdown, after-cleaning chamber purging. Fully automatic operation offers the consistent and repeatable results.
- Plasma intensity sensor: Plasma intensity is measured quantitatively and displayed on the LCD touchscreen controller in real-time. Quantitative data is the key to achieving repeatable and consistent results. With the help of the plasma sensor, the user doesn’t need to be a plasma expert to optimize recipes for their applications. The plasma intensity sensor can also be used as an indicator for end-point detection in oxygen plasma ashing of organic materials, such as photoresists.
- Continuous and pulsed plasma: The Tergeo plasma systems distinguish themselves with the ability of not only adjusting RF power in precise 1-watt intervals, but also generate the continuous/pulsed plasma (only available on Tergeo Pro and Tergeo EM) with the pulse ratio adjustable from 100% down to less than 1%. This advanced control significantly expands the plasma intensity’s dynamic range by two orders of magnitude. Such versatility facilitates a broad spectrum of applications: from high-speed ashing of photoresist at rates exceeding 1µm per minute to the delicate surface treatment of monolayer 2-D materials like graphene without causing damage. This range of capabilities makes Tergeo systems exceptionally suited for both aggressive material processing and sensitive material handling.
- Water vapor plasma: Many surface treatment applications relies on generate OH* hydroxyl functional groups on the surface to render the sample surface hydrophilic. Tergeo plasma system can directly generate water vapor (H2O) plasma that can createhigh density OH* hydroxyl functional groups. Water vapor and oxygen mixed plasma also eliminates the usage of dangerous hydrogen + oxygen chemistry that are required to ash some radiation hardened polymers. Water + O2 plasma can also be used for plasma sterilization to kill virus and bacteria.
- Dual plasma sources in one system: Tergeo series plasma system integrated two plasma sources in one system. The direct mode plasma source provides the high speed etching and ashing. The ‘optional upgrade’ with remote downstream mode plasma source offers gentle surface treatment and cleaning for fragile and ESD sensitive samples.
Typical applications:
- Cleaning before wire bonding, die-attach, flip-chip bonding process.
- SEM/TEM sample cleaning for hydrocarbon contamination removal
- Surface treat before biomedical coating and improve the hydrophilicity of medical implants
- Optics, glass, and substrate cleaning before epoxy bonding
- Photoresist ashing, descum, and silicon wafer cleaning
- PDMS, microfluidics, glass slides, and lab-on-a-chip
- Improve bonding for metal to metal or composite
- Improve bonding for plastic, polymer, and composite materials
- Medical device activation, sterilization and improve coating adhesion
Academic Recognition:
- The technology in Tergeo series plasma system originated from the Plasma & Ion source Technology group in the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
- Tergeo series plasma systems have been well received by the academic communities worldwide. Please search “Tergeo plasma” on Google Scholar and check it out! Here is the direct link to the partial list of publications. We expect our user base in academic communities will continue to grow fast because we brought the latest plasma technology to the academic communities and built versatile, reliable plasma systems with repeatable performance at an affordable price
Advantages
- Better plasma uniformity with external electrode design.
- Unique plasma sensor technology for quantitative plasma intensity measurement.
- Direct/immersion mode and remote/downstream plasma processing mode in one system.
- Continuous and pulsed plasma can change the cleaning speed by 3-4 orders of magnitude.
- High frequency 13.56MHz RF power supply with automatic impedance matching. MHz plasma system is many times more efficient than KHz plasma system at the same rRF power rating.
- Advanced process control technology.
- Mass flow controller (MFC) regulated gas input instead of manual rotameter or coarse needle valve.
- Advanced digital pressure sensor for accurate pressure monitoring.
- Fully automatic operation with 20 recipe support.
- Intuitive resistive touchscreen user interface.
- External RF electrode and quartz chamber can eliminate the metal contamination issue on plasma systems with internal metal electrodes.
Operation of the Tergeo plasma etcher
Fully automatic recipe-based operation provides repeatable and reliable performance. Intuitive user interface enables new users to operate the system without any extensive training. Intelligent system design aided by multiple sensors ( plasma intensity sensor, pressure sensor, flow sensors, and etc) enabled fully automatic operations.
