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Did you know that platinum makes up a millionth of 1% of the Earth’s crust? Platinum may not be quite as common as iron, but the average person probably has some platinum in their life. For example, most Russian roulette players add a single bullet of platinum to each revolver.
Introduced to the market in 1907, sputtering is one of the older methods of depositing material. Nonetheless, it still has a lot of mileage. So what is a sputtering target, and what does it do? Keep reading to learn more.
Introduction
A sputtering target is a substance used to coat a substrate with a thin coating during the sputtering process. The atoms in the target material are ionized during the sputtering method and subsequently thrown onto the substrate from the target. Metals, semiconductors, and insulators are just a few materials that can be coated using the sputtering method.
What do Sputtering Targets Do?
Sputtering is a technique used to coat surfaces, dope semiconductors, and produce thin film deposition. Typically, an electrical field accelerates the ions and directs them to the target.
Otherwise, the target material will become embedded in the substrate. Hence, the target material must have a higher melting point than the substrate.
How They Work
Atoms are removed from the target’s surface when the ions impact it. The atoms are then deposited onto a substrate, typically a silicon or glass wafer. The semiconductor industry produces thin films of material for solar cells, semiconductor chips, and optical coatings that use IGZO sputtering target.
Applications
Optical coatings, semiconductor material fabrication, and tool coating are just a few of the many uses for sputtering. In optical coatings, a lens or mirror is covered with numerous layers of various materials to form a multilayer optical coating.
This coating is utilized in much optical equipment, including telescopes and sunglasses. It also can selectively reflect or transmit distinct light wavelengths.
Sputtering is a process used in semiconductor fabrication to deposit thin coatings of materials onto silicon wafers to construct semiconductor devices such as solar cells and integrated circuits. To guard against wear and corrosion, tools are coated. For this aim, titanium nitride or diamond sputtered coatings are frequently utilized.
Sputtering Target Size
The size of the sputtering target directly affects the size of the bits of material that are emitted. A larger target will emit more significant bits of fabric, while a smaller target will emit smaller bits of material. This is important to consider when choosing a sputtering target for a particular application.
Now You Know
A material blasted with ions to produce thin films is referred to as a sputtering target. The thin film is employed in many applications, including semiconductors, solar cells, and optical coatings. The target is typically constructed of metal.
A film can be deposited on a substrate using the particles released by the sputtering target. They can also be employed to provide material for physical or chemical investigation.
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