94-12824 Manuccia This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project will develop a new kind of compact flow sensor and control system, called the Optical Flow Controller (OFC), for use in chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and other semiconductor processing operations. Phase I successfully tested a laboratory prototype flow controller that uses a new technique called spectral correlation detection (SCD). This is an improved variant of infrared absorption spectroscopy that provides enhanced sensitivity and stability as well as a simplified optical design. Phase II will provide several alpha-test devices for later Phase II development. The OFC device is particularly useful when the analyte is dilute in a carrier gas and is generated by bubbling the carrier through a liquid phase sample of the analyte. This configuration is commonly used in organometallic-CVD and other semiconductor processing applications. The OFC technology is expected to find wide application in commercial manufacture of semiconductor devices, optical components, and thin films.
