Applications

The Atomflo™ plasma systems are a technology breakthrough! They provide a beam of high-density plasma for materials processing at atmospheric pressure and low temperature. The clean reactive gas flows over and through micro-structured materials uniformly treating surfaces without any damage.

The advantages of Surfx’s atmospheric plasma sources are:

Fast treatment: High density of reactive species.
Clean process: No significant particle contamination; less than found in vacuum plasmas.
Low temperature: Plasma safely treats thermally sensitive materials.
No substrate damage: Ions and electrons are confined to the source and do not bombard the surface.
No pump cycles: Operation at atmospheric pressure eliminates complicated and time-consuming pump and vent cycles.
Versatile chemistry: Atomflo™ plasmas employ a wide range of gas and liquid chemistries.
Ease of Integration: Atomflo™ plasma systems have a small footprint and are easily integrated into existing process flows.
Safe and reliable: The plasma source runs continuously with no moving or consumable parts, uses low-voltage RF power, and can be safely operated by hand.
Low cost: Lower cost of ownership (COO) than competing technologies.
Our atmospheric plasma is a low temperature source of atoms and radicals. These reactive species are delivered to the sample to clean, remove, modify, or deposit a material of your choice. The Atomflo™ is the only atmospheric plasma on the market that offers a broad range of surface chemistries. An inert gas, helium or argon, is fed to the source along with a few percent of gas molecules, such as oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, or carbon tetrafluoride, thereby generating O, H, N or F atoms to plasma treat the surface.

The Atomflo™ provides all the power of plasma chemistry with none of the hassle of vacuum operation. Moreover, there is no risk of electrical shock from the source. In the sections below, we describe some of the valuable uses of our exciting product.

Click here to request a free copy of our Application Notes. These notes describe the principles of operation of different atmospheric plasmas, including coronas, dielectric barrier discharges, plasma torches, and the Atomflo™ RF plasma. In addition, they describe the use of atmospheric plasma for surface treatment, including plasma cleaning, plasma coating, etching, and surface activation for adhesion.

To see the Atomflo™ atmospheric plasma system in action, visit our video library.