FIZIKA A 5 (1996) 2, 107-110

INTERACTION OF POLYETHER SULPHONE WITH OXYGEN PLASMA

LIDIJA I. BELIČ, MIRAN MOZETIČ and KAROL POŽUN
Institute of Electronic and Vacuum Technique, Teslova 30, 61000 Ljubljana, Slovenia

Received 7 September 1995

Polyether sulphone was found to be a useful material for production of high reliability humidity sensors. In order to obtain best properties of the sensors, the polymer surface should be activated before a thin layer of metal is deposited. A way to do it is exposition of the polymer to oxygen plasma. In order to prevent destructive action of the plasma, a very mild inductively coupled RF oxygen plasma was created in a vacuum system. The plasma density was of the order of 10¹⁶  m^-3, and the electron temperature 4 eV. Active particles produced in plasma interact with the polymer causing oxidation of the surface layer and a continuous thinning of the polymer foil. In our case the rate of thinning was 25 mm per hour.

UDC 538.971
PACS 68.35.-p

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