Integrated glovebox & UHV line at COCOON

Integrated glovebox infrastructure

The COCOON group has an integrated glovebox infrastructure for thin film deposition onto air-sensitive materials, and for surface and electrochemical characterization, all without exposure to air. All gloveboxes are Ar-filled (O₂ < 1 ppm, H₂O < 1 ppm). The glovebox for surface characterization provides access to instruments for X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and scanning probe microscopy (SPM) for compositional/morphological characterization of the surface. Electrochemical and electrical characterization can be done using several commercial and home-built potentiostat/galvanostat devices. The synthesis glovebox allows for coating of planar substrates and powders by ALD and PVD.

Publications:

Dobbelaere, Thomas, et al. “A USB-controlled potentiostat/galvanostat for thin-film battery characterization” HardwareX 2 (2017) 34-39. DOI: 10.1016/j.ohx.2017.08.001

SPINAL Surface science lab

SPINAL is an ultra-high vacuum (UHV) cluster tool for studying surfaces, thin films and nanostructures. The system consists of a scanning probe microscope (SPM) and a UHV transfer line (the “SPINAL cord” of the tool), which allows for transferring samples between deposition and characterization chambers without air exposure, ensuring the purity and stability of the surface. The COCOON group has attached instruments for (plasma-enhanced) atomic layer deposition (PE-ALD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) to the SPINAL setup. The ALD setup is directly connected to the XPS instrument, allowing sample transfer times below 1 minute. Air-sensitive samples or substrates can be loaded into the system through the Argon glovebox.

Publications:

Minjauw, Matthias, et al. “Nucleation Enhancement and Area-Selective Atomic Layer Deposition of Ruthenium Using RuO₄ and H₂ Gas.” CHEMISTRY OF MATERIALS, vol. 31, no. 5, 2019, pp. 1491–99. DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemmater.8b03852