Electrostatic measurement of plasma plume dynamics in pulsed laser evaporated graphite

Summary form only given. Thin films of Diamond-Like-Carbon (DLC) are routinely produced by pulsed laser evaporation (PLE) of graphite targets, The optical, electrical, and mechanical properties of such films make them rather attractive for applications from wear resistant coatings for optical components to substrate material for advanced semiconductor devices. Pulsed laser deposition (PLD) has numerous advantages, particularly, the presence of energetic species in the plasma results in a large fraction of sp/sup 3/ bonded carbon. This study concentrates on electrostatic (Langmuir) probe measurements in the carbon PLE plume to investigate plume dynamics and, in future work, correlate against film properties.