ABSTRACT
This chapter covers selected topics on the plasma chemical vapor deposition (PCVD) of thin films. PCVD takes place when a heterogeneous chemical reaction between a plasma and one or more of the remaining three states of matter results in the deposition of a thin film. Such a reaction may include participation by the working gas, the plasma active species, and the workpiece surface. Prior to the development of methods for plasma-assisted thin-film deposition, several purely chemical or electrochemical methods were developed for depositing thin films on surfaces. Plasma polymerization is a widely used deposition method in which monomers supplied to, or produced within a deposition chamber by plasma–chemical reactions, polymerize on contact with the workpiece to build up a polymeric coating. A related heterogeneous process is epitaxy, in which atoms of a crystalline material are supplied to a reaction chamber or produced by chemical reactions in the immediate vicinity of the workpiece.
