To date, most of the materials studied in spintronics research at Almaden have been engineered using automated sputter deposition systems. To more fully explore the field, we are developing the PLD-TEON deposition system, a multi-chamber tool that permits the growth of multilayer structures via deposition processes that are impractical to combine in a single chamber system. To learn more about a particular aspect of the instrument, please select a link or use the image map above.

As of March, 2007, the PLD-TEON tool has the following capabilities:

• Unique Central Robot: to move wafers and masks to and from chambers.
• 60-carrier Loadlock: load/unload masks and wafers without venting deposition chamber
• Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD) Chamber: Access to complex oxides via laser ablation
  5 PLD targets + 4 magnetron sources + 1 plasma source + atom sources + high pressure RHEED + ellipsometry
• Analysis Chamber: for in-situ surface and structure measurements
• Mini-TEON: for prototyping new process techniques during chamber design (currently equipped with one TEON-style cluster)

• TEON Chamber: Thermal Evaporation of Oxides and Nitrides (constructed; in development)
  30+ thermal evaporation cells – 6 clusters of 5 cells + atom sources + e-beam evaporation + pyrometer
• PVD (Sputter) Chamber: (in design stage with preliminary testing of critical components)
  magnetron (9x) and ion beam sputtering (5x) – spin engineering
• "Mini-robot" for additional transfers of carriers between stations in the TEON or Sputter process chambers
• Very high speed 5-carrier transfer lock to permit load/unload of up to 5 carriers into or out of the loadlock without venting the loadlock itself.

With its unique combination of capabilities and extended assortment of processes, the PLD-TEON system opens the door to exploration of a much wider variety of more exotic materials for spintronics and quantum material research.

At Almaden we are building one of the world's most advanced thin film deposition systems for the study of atomically engineered thin film heterostructures. Today, we can nano-engineer materials by building them atomic layer by atomic layer. Such materials can display exotic and unusual properties. The PLD-TEON system incorporates seven interconnected vacuum chambers including 4 thin film deposition chambers using pulsed laser deposition (PLD), thermal evaporation - of oxides and nitrides (TEON), in particular- and magnetron and ion-beam sputtering. The four deposition chambers are connected to a central robot chamber to which is also attached a small analysis chamber for in-situ characterization of thin films surfaces and interfaces, and a load-lock chamber through which substrates and shadow masks (for patterning devices laterally on the scale of 20 μm and above), can be introduced into the system. The PLD-TEON system is fully automated and is controlled and monitored by several computers.

One goal of this system is to explore thin film non-equilibrium materials which become superconducting near room temperature. Other projects involve the study of semi-metallic heterostructures which display giant magnetoresistance and the exploration of quantum thin film material system.