IEDF distortion and resolution considerations for RFEA operation at high voltages

Abstract

Retarding field energy analyzers (RFEA) have been used extensively to measure the ion flux energy distribution function of plasmas. For consistency, the ion flux energy distribution function is referred to as the ion energy distribution function (IEDf) even though it more accurately represents the one-dimensional ion velocity distribution function. In the past, these devices have operated at voltages less than 1 kV. Higher operating voltages (>2 kV) are currently desired. For an RFEA to operate at these voltages, design changes are necessary that impact the energy resolution and cause space charge build-up. To investigate the effect the design changes have for a high voltage RFEA, electromagnetic simulations and particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations were used to analyze the electric field between the grids, the potential drop in the grid holes, and space charge build-up between the grids. Non-unique optimized dimensions for the RFEA increased the electric field uniformity. The optimization minimizes the electric field from distorting the IV curve or adversely affecting the energy resolution. It was found that a larger grid gap distance and smaller grid hole diameter decreases the potential drop in the grid holes improving energy resolution. IV curves from the PIC simulation were used to obtain space charge distorted IEDfs. The point at which space charge distorts the IV curve is dependent on the grid gap distance and incoming flux. Space charge build-up was found to only affect low energy ions which manifested by cutting off the low energy portion of the IEDf. To fix space charge distortions, the flux into the probe can be limited or it may be possible to account for the distortion when calculating the IEDf.