Temporal evolution in an ion-matrix sheath during plasma immersion ion implantation

Plasma immersion ion implantation (PIII) has proven to be a low cost and high efficient surface modification technique to treat complex shaped objects. The target is immersed in a plasma, and the ions, extracted from the plasma directly, are accelerated and then implanted into the surface by applying negative high-voltage pulses to the target. In order to describe the implantation dynamics, the plasma sheath has been studied by the particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation through the solution of the Poisson's equation, the Bolzmann's approximation for the electrons and the Newton's equation of the movement of ions in the grid. The temporal evolution ion-matrix sheath including the potential, ion density, ion velocity, kinetic energy and ion current density is paid more attention.