Radial optical emission profiles of RF parallel plate glow discharges

Summary form only given. The radial optical emission of an RF discharge was studied to determine the plasma uniformity in a parallel-plate system known as the GEC Reference Cell. Two argon lines were examined: the 7504 /spl Aring/ neutral line and the 4278 /spl Aring/ ion line. Paraxial rays from the discharge were telescoped down onto a 1024-channel intensified diode array by means of a 1-meter spectrograph. The detector was rotated by 90/spl deg/, which allowed the recording of the intensity of 1024 spatially distinct points parallel to the electrode surface at one wavelength. This method was used to map out the whole interelectrode plasma at pressures of 0.1, 0.25, 0.5, and 1.0 torr at 75, 100, 150, and 200 V/sub p-p/ for an argon flow of 20 sccm.