Description

Getters are materials widely used in industry to create and maintain vacuum. To realize ultra-high vacuum at low temperatures, a new technology has been developed based on the Non-Evaporable Getter (NEG) thin film coatings. These coatings, produced by sputtering, may recover their chemical reactivity (i.e. pumping function) by heating at temperature as low as 180 °C.
NEG thin-film coatings have been developed for the LHC project and have been already tested in a real accelerator at ESFR - Grenoble and ELECTRA-Sincotrone Trieste.

Areas of expertise

High and ultra-high vacuums; Surfaces and coatings.

Applications

• Improvement of pumps or creation of innovative pumps.
• Electron and cathode tubes.
• Vacuumthermal insulation at high temperature (solar applications).
• Vacuumcomponents of any types (blanks, bellows, crosses, Tees, transitions) to replace or complement pumps of other types.
• Microelectronics.
• Vacuum thermal insulation at low temperature.

Innovative features

• After activation, the surface outgassing induced by radiation and / or particle bombardment is strongly reduced.
• The coating blocks the outgassing of the underlying vacuum chamber walls.
• The vacuum chamber is transformed from a gas source into a pump.

Specifications

• NEG performance was characterised using 20 different types of materials.
• Baking at temperature in the range 180 ℃ to 400 ℃.
• Ultra-high vacuum is achieved (10 - 13 Torr).

Advantages

• Reversible process for hydrogen.
• Up to 50 venting cycles possible with a marginal performance loss.

Limitations

• Can not be exposed too often to ambient air.
• Requires high degree of know-how.

Intellectual Property status

Ready for licensing except for systems for microscope ion and electron beam source chamber and sputter-ion pumps. Patented technology, WO9749109.