Conceptual Design of a Deposition System for Uniform and Combinatorial Synthesis of Multinary Thin-Film Materials via Open-Boat Physical-Vapor Deposition

Conventional flux-distribution formulas for rotating and static substrates are used to develop a method for combinatorial physical-vapor deposition. With this method, a single deposition system may be used, without modification, to deposit either highly uniform or graded-composition thin-film materials. This is accomplished through appropriate automated sequencing of source shuttersand substrate rotation. A constrained-composition parametrization is introduced, whichdetermines relative deposition times for the film constituents with and without substraterotation. The combinatorial deposition scheme developed here is applicable to binary, ternary,or quaternary phase systems. Examples are considered for the pseudoquaternary CuIn Se2 -AgIn Se2 -CuGa Se2 -AgGa Se2 chalcopyrite materials system, which has relevance to thin-film photovoltaics.