5173 results about "Argon" patented technology

Embodiments of the invention provide treatment processes to reduce substrate contamination during a fabrication process within a vapor deposition chamber. A treatment process may be conducted before, during or after a vapor deposition process, such as an atomic layer deposition (ALD) process. In one example of an ALD process, a process cycle, containing an intermediate treatment step and a predetermined number of ALD cycles, is repeated until the deposited material has a desired thickness. The chamber and substrates may be exposed to an inert gas, an oxidizing gas, a nitriding gas, a reducing gas or plasmas thereof during the treatment processes. In some examples, the treatment gas contains ozone, water, ammonia, nitrogen, argon or hydrogen. In one example, a process for depositing a hafnium oxide material within a batch process chamber includes a pretreatment step, an intermediate step during an ALD process and a post-treatment step.

Methods and apparatus for depositing an amorphous carbon layer on a substrate are provided. In one embodiment, a deposition process includes positioning a substrate in a substrate processing chamber, introducing a hydrocarbon source having a carbon to hydrogen atom ratio of greater than 1:2 into the processing chamber, introducing a plasma initiating gas selected from the group consisting of hydrogen, helium, argon, nitrogen, and combinations thereof into the processing chamber, with the hydrocarbon source having a volumetric flow rate to plasma initiating gas volumetric flow rate ratio of 1:2 or greater, generating a plasma in the processing chamber, and forming a conformal amorphous carbon layer on the substrate.

The present invention is a method, process and apparatus for selective cleaning, drying, and modifying substrate surfaces and depositing thin films thereon using a dense phase gas solvent and admixtures within a first created supercritical fluid antisolvent. Dense fluids are used in combination with sub-atmospheric, atmospheric and super-atmospheric plasma adjuncts (cold and thermal plasmas) to enhance substrate surface cleaning, modification, precision drying and deposition processes herein. Moreover, conventional wet cleaning agents such as hydrofluoric acid and ammonium fluoride may be used with the present invention to perform substrate pre-treatments prior to precision drying and cleaning treatments described herein. Finally, dense fluid such as solid phase carbon dioxide and argon may be used as a follow-on treatment or in combination with plasmas to further treat a substrate surface.

A power plant including an air separation unit (ASU) arranged to separate nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide and argon from air and produce a stream of substantially pure liquid oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide and argon; a steam generator, fired or unfired, arranged to combust a fuel, e.g., natural gas, liquefied natural gas, synthesis gas, coal, petroleum coke, biomass, municipal solid waste or any other gaseous, liquid or solid fuel in the presence of air and a quantity of substantially pure oxygen gas to produce an exhaust gas comprising water, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, nitrogen, sulfur oxides and other trace gases, and a steam-turbine-generator to produce electricity, a primary gas heat exchanger unit for particulate/acid gas/moisture removal and a secondary heat exchanger arranged to cool the remainder of the exhaust gases from the steam generator. Exhaust gases are liquefied in the ASU thereby recovering carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, nitrogen, sulfur oxides, oxygen, and all other trace gases from the steam generator exhaust gas stream. The cooled gases are liquefied in the ASU and separated for sale or re-use in the power plant. Carbon dioxide liquid is transported from the plant for use in enhanced oil recovery or for other commercial use. Carbon dioxide removal is accomplished in the ASU by cryogenic separation of the gases, after directing the stream of liquid nitrogen from the air separation unit to the exhaust gas heat exchanger units to cool all of the exhaust gases including carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, nitrogen, oxygen, sulfur oxides, and other trace gases.

A semiconductor device comprising an insulation film covering a semiconductor chip so as to expose electrodes or pads fabricated in the chip and wiring lines located on the insulation film and connected to the respective electrodes or pads is produced by a method which comprises: providing a semiconductor chip provided with an insulation film covering the chip so as to expose a conductor layer for electrodes or pads fabricated in the chip, ion milling the surface of the chip provided with the insulation film by a mixed gas of argon and hydrogen, forming a patterned conductor layer for wiring lines on the ion-milled surface of the chip, and dry etching the surface of the chip provided with the insulation film and the patterned conductor layer by nitrogen gas.

A method and apparatus for conditioning an oxide surface during a semiconductor device formation process is provided herein. One or more plasma processing operations are performed on a substrate having a fin structure and shallow trench isolation structure (STI) formed thereon. An oxygen containing plasma process may modify surfaces of the STI structure in preparation for an argon containing plasma process. The argon containing plasma process may form a first layer on the fin structure and STI structure and an ammonia fluoride containing plasma process may form a second layer on the first layer. The first and second layers may be removed from the substrate during a subsequent heating process to provide a cleaned fin structure suitable for subsequent processing operations.

A magnetron sputter reactor (410) and its method of use, in which SIP sputtering and ICP sputtering are promoted is disclosed. In another chamber (412) an array of auxiliary magnets positioned along sidewalls (414) of a magnetron sputter reactor on a side towards the wafer from the target is disclosed. The magnetron (436) preferably is a small one having a stronger outer pole (442) of a first polarity surrounding a weaker inner pole (440) of a second polarity all on a yoke (444) and rotates about the axis (438) of the chamber using rotation means (446, 448, 450). The auxiliary magnets (462) preferably have the first polarity to draw the unbalanced magnetic field (460) towards the wafer (424), which is on a pedestal (422) supplied with power (454). Argon (426) is supplied through a valve (428). The target (416) is supplied with power (434).

A medical implant made of polymeric material having an increased oxidation resistance is formed by a method including the steps of placing a resin powder in a sealed container. A substantial portion of the oxygen is removed from the sealed contained by either a vacuum, an oxygen absorbent or by flushing with inert gas. The container is then repressurized with a gas such as nitrogen, argon, helium or neon so that long term storage may be possible. On use, the resin in transferred to a forming device which both melts and forms the resin in an oxygen reduced atmosphere to produce a polymeric raw material such as a rod or bar stock. The medical implant is then formed from this raw material annealed and sealed in an airtight package in an oxygen reduced atmosphere. The implant is then radiation sterilized and thereafter annealed in the package for a predetermined time and temperature sufficient to form cross-links between any free radicals in neighboring polymeric chains.

The invention relates to a high-entropy alloy material and a method for preparing the same. The component of the high-entropy alloy material is AlCoCrFeNiTix, wherein x represents a molar ratio, and the value range is between 0.1-0.4. The method for preparing the material comprises: preparing raw materials, adopting the alloy smelting raw materials including Al, Co, Cr, Fe, Ni and Ti, and accurately weighing and proportioning according to the molar ratio; then, purifying oxide on a metal surface; putting the prepared raw materials into a tank in a water-cooling copper-formed mold smelting pool, vacuumizing, filling argon, controlling smelting current to be at about 250 ampere and smelting time for 30-60 seconds, turning an alloy block after alloys are fully mixed, putting an alloy ingot into a tank of a water-cooling copper-formed mold, regulating the smelting current, opening a suction casting air suction valve after the alloys are uniformly smelted, utilizing the negative pressure in a pump for suction casting, and taking out the alloy ingot after an alloy mould is cooled. Compared with the conventional crystalline state alloy, the high-entropy alloy material has relative high thermal stability, hardness, yield strength, breaking tenacity, plastic deformation and work hardening capacity.

The invention discloses a method for graphene epitaxial growth on 4H-SiC silicon surface, mainly solving the problems of small graphene area and poor homogeneity during graphene epitaxial growth on the 4H-SiC silicon surface. The method is as follows: a 4H-SiC silicon surface is cleaned to remove organic remains and ionic contaminants on the surface; hydrogen and propane are led in to carry out hydrogen corrosion to the 4H-SiC silicon surface to remove surface scratches so as to form regular step-shaped stripes; silane is led in to remove oxide formed by hydrogen corrosion on the surface; under the circumstance of argon, silicon atoms are evaporated to ensure carbon atom to reconstruct and form epitaxial graphene in the form of sp by heating. The invention can be used for manufacturing epitaxial graphene materials.

Embodiments of the present invention provide a S-EGR process that yields an exhaust stream that includes a relatively high concentration of a desirable gas and is also substantially oxygen-free. This desirable gas includes, but is not limited to: Carbon Dioxide (CO2), Nitrogen (N2), or Argon.

A method of forming a dielectric layer is described. The method deposits a silicon-containing film by chemical vapor deposition using a local plasma. The silicon-containing film is flowable during deposition at low substrate temperature. A silicon precursor (e.g. a silylamine, higher order silane or halogenated silane) is delivered to the substrate processing region and excited in a local plasma. A second plasma vapor or gas is combined with the silicon precursor in the substrate processing region and may include ammonia, nitrogen (N₂), argon, hydrogen (H₂) and/or oxygen (O₂). The equipment configurations disclosed herein in combination with these vapor/gas combinations have been found to result in flowable deposition at substrate temperatures below or about 200° C. when a local plasma is excited using relatively low power.

The automatic argon arc welding and narrow gas submerged arc welding process for circular pipe header seam features the first horizontal and vertical welding with immobile workpiece and using automatic cold welding TIG wire until completing over one third of circle; the subsequent welding in the other two thirds of circle with automatically rotating welding roller frame; and the performing in the identical site of the annular seam assembling and the welding. The welding apparatus for the said technological process consists of roller device and welding frame bogie, and the welding frame bogie on some tracks parallel to roller frame tracks is movable. The present invention has the advantages of automatic operation, raised welding quality, etc.

A copper filled damascene structure and method for forming the same the method including providing a substrate comprising a semiconductor substrate; forming an insulator layer on the substrate; forming a damascene opening through a thickness portion of the insulator layer; forming a diffusion barrier layer to line the damascene opening; forming a first seed layer overlying the diffusion barrier; plasma treating the first seed layer in-situ with a first treatment plasma comprising plasma source gases selected from the group consisting of argon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and NH₃; forming a second seed layer overlying the first seed layer; forming a copper layer overlying the second seed layer according to an electro-chemical plating (ECP) process to fill the damascene opening; and, planarizing the copper layer to form a metal interconnect structure.

A method of reducing pollutants exhausted into the atmosphere from the combustion of fossil fuels. The disclosed process removes nitrogen from air for combustion, separates the solid combustion products from the gases and vapors and can capture the entire vapor/gas stream for sequestration leaving near-zero emissions. The invention produces up to three captured material streams. The first stream is contaminant-laden water containing SO_x, residual NO_x particulates and particulate-bound Hg and other trace contaminants. The second stream can be a low-volume flue gas stream containing N₂ and O₂ if CO₂ purification is needed. The final product stream is a mixture comprising predominantly CO₂ with smaller amounts of H₂O, Ar, N₂, O₂, SO_X, NO_X, Hg, and other trace gases.

A substrate-free gas-phase synthesis apparatus and method that is capable of rapidly and continuously producing graphene in ambient conditions without the use of graphite or substrates is provided. Graphene sheets are continuously synthesized in fractions of a second by sending an aerosol consisting of argon gas and liquid ethanol droplets into an atmospheric-pressure microwave-generated argon plasma field. The ethanol droplets are evaporated and dissociated in the plasma, forming graphene sheets that are collected. The apparatus can be scaled for the large-scale production of clean and highly ordered graphene and its many applications. The graphene that is produced is clean and highly ordered with few lattice imperfections and oxygen functionalities and therefore has improved characteristics over graphene produced by current methods in the art. The graphene that is produced by the apparatus and methods was shown to be particularly useful as a support substrate that enabled direct atomic resolution imaging of organic molecules and interfaces with nanoparticles at a level previously unachievable.

The invention relates to an intensive anodic oxidation process to prepare porous anodic alumina film. An aluminum sheet is as an anode; a platinum sheet as a cathode; argon as shielded gas; mixed solution of perchloric acid with absolute alcohol as electrochemical polishing compound for the aluminum sheet; mixed solution of oxalic acid, absolute alcohol and deionized water as electrolyte; and mixed solution of phosphoric acid, chromic acid and deionized water as alumina film corrodent. Through aluminum sheet annealing, purging, electrochemical polishing, mild anodic oxidation, corrosion on aluminum sheet oxide film, intensive anodic oxidation and stripping oxide film, and finally, pale yellow, high purity and ordered porous-structured nanometer-leveled alumina film is achieved; The alumina film pore is in circular shape sized in 30 to 35nm, pore distance in 80 to100nm and pore depth in 162.4 micrometers; growth rate of the alumina film is 54 micrometers/h, which is 27 times higher than 2 micrometers/h of growth rate of anodic oxidation aluminum film prepared through mild anodic oxidation process.

The present invention relates to a field emission device comprising an anode and a cathode, wherein said cathode includes carbon nanotubes which have been treated with an ion beam. The ion beam may be any ions, including gallium, hydrogen, helium, argon, carbon, oxygen, and xenon ions. The present invention also relates to a field emission cathode comprising carbon nanotubes, wherein the nanotubes have been treated with an ion beam. A method for treating the carbon nanotubes and for creating a field emission cathode is also disclosed. A field emission display device containing carbon nanotube which have been treated with an ion beam is further disclosed.

The invention relates to a method for welding a carbon steel composite pipe of a thin iron-nickel-based alloy. The method comprises: processing a step on the end part of the composite pipe; adopting the surfacing of argon arc welding on the surface of the step and trimming the surfacing layer; processing a groove; adopting tungsten electrode argon arc welding to carry out three-point positioning of spot welding evenly around a welding seam, and adopting the tungsten electrode argon arc welding to carry out back welding on the root; and adopting manual electric arc welding to carry out filling welding and overlay welding on the upper part of a second layer of back welding. The chemical compositions of a welding material by weight percentage: 0.02 to 0.1 percent of C, 0.2 to 1.0 percent of Si, 1.0 to 2.2 percent of Mn, 20.0 to 31.5 percent of Cr, 40.0 to 60.0 percent of Ni, 8.0 to 14.5 percent of Mo, 0.5 to 2.5 percent of Cu, 0 to 5.0 percent of Co, 0.3 to 4.2 percent of Nb, and the balance being Fe. The welding seam has the characteristics of no sensitivity to offset, favorable corrosion resistance, high strength and favorable plastic toughness.

A magnetic recording medium is formed with a distribution of low coercivity regions functioning as a transition pattern for servo information capable of being sensed by a read/write head by exposing a masked magnetic layer to ions to change the coercivity of the exposed magnetic layer without substantially affecting the topography of the magnetic layer.

Embodiments of the present invention include forming a series of substantially radially extending low coercivity regions used to divide the magnetic layer into a plurality of sectors comprising substantially concentric circumferentially extending data tracks by exposing a masked magnetic layer having a high coercivity, i.e. from about 2000 Oe to about 10000 Oe, to one or more heavy atom ion bombardments of gaseous ions, e.g. argon ions, at a dose of about 1×10¹³ atoms/cm² to about 9×10¹⁵ atoms/cm² having an implantation energy of about 10 KeV to about 50 KeV.

An apparatus and method are disclosed in which ultrasonic vibration is used to assist the degassing of molten metals or metal alloys thereby reducing gas content in the molten metals or alloys. High-intensity ultrasonic vibration is applied to a radiator that creates cavitation bubbles, induces acoustic streaming in the melt, and breaks up purge gas (e.g., argon or nitrogen) which is intentionally introduced in a small amount into the melt in order to collect the cavitation bubbles and to make the cavitation bubbles survive in the melt. The molten metal or alloy in one version of the invention is an aluminum alloy. The ultrasonic vibrations create cavitation bubbles and break up the large purge gas bubbles into small bubbles and disperse the bubbles in the molten metal or alloy more uniformly, resulting in a fast and clean degassing.

The method for manufacturing a semiconductor device according to the invention includes forming a thick silicon oxide film uniformly in a trench. Argon ions or the like implanted obliquely into the trench to form an ion implanted damaged region selectively in the portion of the silicon oxide film on the trench sidewall utilizing the shadowing effects of the oblique ion implantation. The silicon oxide film is wet etched to selectively remove the silicon oxide film in the ion implanted damaged region utilizing the etching rate difference, wherein the etching rate is faster in the damaged region than in the undamaged region. As a result, a thick residual oxide film is formed on the bottom and the lower sidewall portion of the trenchwithout causing any bird's beak.

The invention discloses a method for preparing a spherical powder material used for three-dimensional printing. The method includes the steps of raw material selecting, high-energy ball milling and radio-frequency plasma spherizing. Selected raw materials are metal or alloy powder in the step of raw material selecting; the step of high-energy ball milling is carried out under the argon shielding condition, petroleum ether serves as the ball milling medium, and the metal or alloy powder is aluminum alloy powder, or titanium alloy powder, or nickel-base alloy powder, or stainless steel powder or tungsten alloy powder; according to the step of radio-frequency plasma spherizing, the total gas flow is 100 L/min-200 L/min, the input power of plasma is 50 kW-100 kW, the negative pressure of a gas outlet of a system is minus 1000 Pa-minus 2000 Pa, and the powder conveying amount is 50 g/min-150 g/min. The manufactured spherical powder is high in sphericity degree, even in granularity, low in oxygen content and good in liquidity, has few defects and is suitable for three-dimensional printing. The method for preparing the spherical powder material used for three-dimensional printing has the advantage that the process is accurate and controllable.

A semiconductor device includes a first insulating layer over a substrate, a first metal oxide layer over the first insulating layer, an oxide semiconductor layer over the first metal oxide layer, a second metal oxide layer over the oxide semiconductor layer, a gate insulating layer over the second metal oxide layer, a second insulating layer over the second metal oxide layer, and a gate electrode layer over the gate insulating layer. The gate insulating layer includes a region in contact with a side surface of the gate electrode layer. The second insulating layer includes a region in contact with the gate insulating layer. The oxide semiconductor layer includes first to third regions. The first region includes a region overlapping with the gate electrode layer. The second region, which is between the first and third regions, includes a region overlapping with the gate insulating layer or the second insulating layer. The second and third regions each include a region containing an element N (N is phosphorus, argon, or xenon).

The invention discloses a production method of low-silicon and low-carbon deep punching/drawing steel, bottom-blowing argon is performed in the whole process of converter smelting, and a single slag/double slag technique is adopted to pour out the dephosphorized slag, high-basicity slag is produced in later period, the dualistic basicity of final slag R is more than 3.5, the terminal temperature of molten steel is 1620 DEG C to 1650 DEG C, and tapping ( P ) is less than 0.012 percent. The molten steel is refined by adopting low-silicon and low-carbon high-basicity reductive slag in a LF furnace refining station, thus to manufacture reductive slag for desulphurisation, and the ( Al ) in the molten steel is less than 0.005 percent. The molten steel refined by the LF furnace is vacuum-treated by a RH vacuum furnace, the carbon and the silicon in the molten steel is circularly removed, the molten steel is continuously casted into a casting blank through a CSP sheet bar conticaster, the casting blank is sent into CSP sheet bar heat continuous rolling mill and rolled into a coiled sheet after being heated in a roller hearth soaking furnace, a hot rolled coiled sheet is coldrolled into cold rolled coiled sheet through a cold tandem mill or a single mill after being acidwashed, and leveled through a leveling machine after being annealed by a cover furnace, and a leveling divided coil is stretched and divided. The production method has the advantages that the production cost of the working procedure is saved, the consumption of the refractory consumption of the converter is reduced, the equipment investment is saved, the process of the production technique is steady and smooth, the n value of the cold rolled plate is bigger than 0.23, the r value thereof is bigger than 2.1, and the deep punching performance and the extensibility are good.

The invention relates to a welding method of a girth weld of an inner cladding thin-walled stainless steel composite tube. The welding method comprises the following steps: girth welds of the inner cladding stainless steel composite tube are respectively and gradually welded by three welding seams, an inner cladding layer welding seam and a transition layer welding seam are welded by argon tungsten-arc welding, the stainless steel inner cladding layer welding seam adopts welding wires with the same quality thereof, the transition layer welding seam adopts ER309 welding wires, and the base layer is welded by shielded metal arc welding or CO2 gas shielded welding and adopts a welding material matched with the strength of the base layer; and the inner cladding layer, the transition layer and the first layer of the base layer are welded under back argon gas protection. The welding method guarantees corrosion resistance of a joint of the inner cladding layer and mechanical property of a welding joint of the base layer; and the method plays an important role in promoting wide application of the inner cladding stainless steel composite tube in businesses such as oil-gas delivery, chemical industry, oil refining and the like, improving corrosion resistance of an inner wall of a pipe, and solving the problems of high cost and the like caused by adopting a full wall-thickness stainless steel pipe.

A process for the plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition of silicon nitride films from nitrogen, argon, xenon, helium or ammonia and an aminosilane, preferably of the formula: (t-C₄H₉NH)₂SiH₂ that provides improved properties, particularly etch resistance and low hydrogen concentrations as well as stress control, of the resulting film for use in the semiconductor industry.

The energy-free refrigeration door of the present application provides a way to control condensation when the door of a refrigeration unit is opened by providing thermal insulation to the door with glass panels which have a low emissivity coating. The door includes a door frame housing and an insulating glass unit comprising inner, middle and outer sheets of glass. A first sealant assembly disposed around the periphery of the inner and middle sheets of glass forms a first chamber between the inner and middle sheets of glass. A second sealant assembly disposed around the periphery of the middle and outer sheets of glass forms a second chamber between the middle and outer sheets of glass. A gas, such as krypton, air, or argon is held in the first and second chambers. The outer sheet of glass and inner sheet of glass each have an unexposed surface that faces the middle sheet of glass. A low emissivity coating is disposed on the unexposed surfaces of the inner and outer sheets of glass so that the glass door as a whole avoids formation of condensation on the outer surface of the outer sheet of the glass door, without the application of electricity to heat the door, while also providing the desired evaporation rate of condensation from the inner side of the inner sheet of the glass door. An anti-fog or anti-frost coating is included on a surface of one of the sheets of glass.

Systems and methods for synthesizing continuous graphene sheets are provided. The systems and methods include passing a catalyst substrate through a heated chemical vapor deposition chamber and exposing the substrate to a reaction gas mixture of hydrogen and hydrocarbon at a preselected location within the chamber. The reaction gas mixture can include hydrogen having a partial pressure of between about 0 Torr and 20 Torr, hydrocarbon having a partial pressure of between about 20 mTorr and about 10 Torr, and one or more buffer gases. The buffer gases can include argon or other noble gases to maintain atmospheric pressure within the chemical deposition chamber. The resulting graphene can be made with continuous mono and multilayers (up to six layers) and have single crystalline hexagonal grains with a preselected nucleation density and domain size for a range of applications.

The invention discloses a method for large-calibre aluminium-alloy pipeline no-liner tungsten electrode argon arc one-side welding both-side formation, comprising the following steps of: assembling of groove angle and clearance, grinding of tungsten electrode, cleaning before welding, adjusting welding process parameters, tack welding, and welding of a bottom coating, a filling layer and a covering layer. The pipe is horizontally fixed and the position is marked by hour; the welding sequence is left half-ring and right half-ring; each half-ring comprises overhead welding, vertical position welding and downhand welding; the welding is started at a position where L is equal to 5-10mm close to six of the overhead welding; the vertical position welding is then carried out; finally, the front half-ring is ended at 12 of the downhand welding; before the rear half-ring starts welding, the connection is grinded as a slope; the welding seam formed by the connection and the front half-ring welding position is overlapped by 3-5mm; the welding of the rear half-ring is started from 6 of the overhead welding and ended at 12 of the downhand welding through the vertical position welding; the welding is carried out by a continuous feeding method. The surface of the welding seam of the method has no pores or cracks, is completely welded and beautiful, and has good internal and external forming; by the non-destructive testing, the first-time qualification rate achieves 100%, the welding seam achieves the class-1 quality, the construction procedures are reduced, and the construction cost is reduced.