Topic:
Glossary: D
Here you are going to find explications of important terms in plasma technology:
- degreasing
- Removal of carbo-hydrates.
- desmear process
- see „desmearing process“
- desmearing process
- Cleaning of the boreholes in the production of printed circuit boards; etch-back - removal of polymer residues after drilling (e.g. laser drilling). Desmearing can be executed in both low-pressure and atmospheric plasma processes.
- desorption
- Desorption means the process where foreign atoms or molecules leave the surface of a solid body and gas. Desorption represents thus the inverted process of adsorption and adsorption.
- die bonding
- Bonding process between chip and circuit board in the production
process of a circuit.
Wire-bonding is usually performed using ultra-thin Al or gold wires. Openair®-plasma is applied to clean the circuit board, in order to optimally prepare the bonding pads for the wire-bonding process. - DLC coatings
- Diamond-like Carbon coatings are coatings of extreme hardness, good antifrictional properties, and resistancy against corrosion, acids and leaches that are formed from hydrocarbon gases during the plasma CVD process. Mainly used on movable parts that are subject to high load through abrasion.
- DLC: diamond-like carbon
- Via plasma coating, it is possible to generate micrometer-thin layers of diamond-like carbon. If the layers contain hydrogen, they are also called amorphous carbon layers (a-C:H). Depending on the ratio of the carbon atoms' sp2/sp3-hybridisation and the hydrogen proportion, DLC, or a-C:H respectively, have different properties, like e.g. very good dynamic friction properties, a high abrasion resistivity, low friction or conductivity.
- downstream plasma
- see “downstream reactor”
- downstream reactor
- Plasma reactor, mostly utilized for cleaning or etching processes in which plasma and substrate are spatially separated. The radicals and ions generated in the plasma are transported to the remote substrate surface by a fast stream of the process gas.
- downstream reactor
- Technology where the sample or the product is not directly in the operating range of the plasma, but is placed in a certain distance (remote) or rather in a separate chamber downstream. That way, the ions can not reach the surface and the samples are pre-treated in a gentle manner.
- dry etching
- Plasma etching works by ablation of a surface through chemical or physical effects. This can be performed with the aid of oxidising process gases (e.g. oxygen), or through bombardment by charged or accelerated particles (e.g. argon). A side-effect can be fine keying or the surface, through which the surface is enlarged.
- dynamic friction
- see "friction"


