Computational comparative study of microwave probes for plasma density measurement

A microwave probe is known to be a suitable method to measure plasma density, even in the processing condition and is widely used in various environments of low-temperature processing plasmas. Various types of microwave probes have been researched and developed to measure the precise plasma density. Extensive research has been conducted to investigate each probes characteristic responding to the plasma parameters (plasma density, electron temperature, pressure, sheath width, and so forth) based on both experiments and simulations. However, a comparative study elucidating the relative characteristics of each probe has not been completed yet, despite the wide applications of the probes in processing plasma. We conduct a comparative study among the microwave probes using the numerical method of three-dimensional finite-difference time-domain simulation. In this study, the microwave probes are compared by investigating the precision of plasma density measurement under a comprehensive range of plasma parameters (plasma density, pressure, and sheath width).