Alicat Scientific, Inc.

Tucson,  AZ 
United States
https://www.alicat.com/

• Booth: 6480

Your orders, built to your spec, then shipped fast!

Overview

Alicat Scientific manufactures custom mass flow and pressure meters and controllers for gas and liquid applications.

Our vacuum series mass flow controllers are preconfigured to easily fit, and work, in vacuum processes—like CVD, ALD, PVD, and coating. Alicat excels in customizing, rertrofitting, and refurbishing for legacy nodes, providing quality analyitical equipment at fast lead times.

Alicat Scientific's mass flow devices are NIST traceable and are backed by an unsurpassed history of performance and reliability. We at Alicat have spent the last decade fulfilling our goal of helping customers build reliable, repeatable, and dependable systems incorporating our feature-rich, precision mass flow meters and mass flow controllers. Our devices have been instrumental in helping customers save time and money by reducing downtime and material loss and increasing measurement precision. Alicat Scientific has earned a solid reputation by providing accurate and dependable products and never wavering from a strict policy of superior customer support.

  Press Releases

• Increasing vacuum deposition speed and stability with upstream pressure control (Sep 08, 2025)

  Upstream pressure control provides numerous benefits to vacuum deposition setups. Regulating pressure upstream of the vacuum chamber eliminates the need for additional valves, reducing equipment costs and minimizing potential leak points. A fast-acting, proportional control valve additionally improves deposition speed and stability.

  Challenge: Traditional downstream pressure setups are slow, expensive, and can be a hassle to upgrade

  Vacuum deposition setups traditionally use downstream pressure control, which is problematic for a few reasons. These setups:

  • Utilize expensive throttle valves
  • Experience delays when changing gas flows or while waiting for the gas in the chamber to settle
  • Require a separate control module to power the valve, provide PID data, and control the setpoint of the pressure controller

  Upgrading systems is also problematic, as legacy equipment can be a pain to replace. It is optimal to upgrade systems with equipment that can easily be dropped in without the need for a major system redesign.

  Solution: Minimize pressure fluctuations using easy-to-integrate upstream pressure controllers

  The PC-EXTSEN pressure controller is designed to smoothly integrate into your existing system without requiring any other design changes. This device is mounted upstream of the vacuum chamber and uses an external sensor, such as the existing vacuum gauge, to control vacuum levels. The pressure controller can additionally be standardized on and connected to a common control interface, using serial or analog communications, or an industrial protocol such as EtherCAT.

  

  The Alicat pressure controller maintains the chamber pressure precisely at the desired level.

  This pressure controller is most useful when the process requires high or ultra-high vacuum, necessitating the external gauge. The PC-EXTSEN takes an analog signal from the gauge and provides closed-loop control using a proportional valve. It powers the external vacuum gauge and is compatible with all gauge technologies including ion, pirani, and cold cathode, as well as active or passive gauges and combination gauges.

  Rapid response times as fast as 30 ms and a high repeatability of up to ±0.08% of full scale together prevent disturbances to the system pressure and result in highly consistent vacuum coatings.

  Keep reading: EtherCAT industrial communication for vacuum setups

  Eliminate the throttle valve bulk using IVC-Series integrated vacuum controllers

  Using this external pressure sensor in conjunction with the vacuum gauge allows you to most accurately maintain the vacuum chamber pressure, even while changing or adjusting the gases being flowed in. This allows for faster application of neutral gases and overall improved system control via the steady pressure levels in the coating environment.

  For setups without an existing vacuum gauge, the IVC-Series pressure controllers eliminate the need for a gauge. The IVC-Series directly integrates a high-accuracy vacuum sensor for reliable control as low as 0.01 milliTorr. Similarly to the PC-EXTSEN, this device is able to cut out the bulk, complication, and expense of a traditional throttle valve pressure control method.

  These pressure controllers can also be configured with a pneumatically isolated sensor, which can be plumbed directly into your vacuum chamber. This sensor allows for precision measurement of the vacuum chamber regardless of the composition of the flowing gas.

  

  IVC-Series pressure controller with integrated vacuum sensor

  Conclusion

  Alicat applications engineers will always recommend upstream pressure control for thin film deposition applications. Depending on the parameters of your setup and whether you are looking to design with or without an external vacuum gauge, either a PC-EXTSEN or an IVC-Series pressure controller may be advantageous.

  Pressure controllers with external sensors are able to integrate gauge signals directly while providing upstream control. Pressure controllers with integrated vacuum sensors are simple solutions, requiring less equipment in a setup.

  In either case, placing pressure control devices upstream of the chamber in vacuum coating applications saves time and cost, and increases accuracy in vacuum deposition tools.

• Transition from Manual and Mechanical Controls to Electronic Precision and Automation (Sep 08, 2025)
  

  PVD coating techniques use physical processes to deposit thin films on surfaces. These films offer an extremely convenient way to obtain desirable surface characteristics without having to completely change the material of a product. The layers can be as thin as only thousandths of a nanometer and can transform all types of surfaces to resist corrosion, decrease friction, increase hardness, and much more.

  In this article, we will explore the two most common methods of physical vapor deposition used to apply PVD coatings, thermal evaporation and sputtering deposition.

  PVD method 1: Thermal evaporation

  Thermal energy is used to vaporize the target material so it can be used to deposit thin film onto the substrate. Deposited materials may include pure metals, non‑metals, oxides, and nitrides. This process offers a high level of control over film properties like thickness, adhesion, stress, and grain structure. Compared to other PVD and CVD techniques, thermal evaporation has one of the highest deposition rates.

  A typical thermal evaporation system consists of the following components:

  • Substrate(s) and target
  • Heat source
  • Vacuum pump
  • Pressure controller / Gate valve
  • Deposition rate monitor
  • RGA (optional)

  Thermal evaporation requires a very high vacuum of about (1×10-6 to 1×10-9 Torr). The required vacuum level depends on purity needs and the required mean free path. While differing in some specifics such as level of vacuum, the following three steps are common to all thermal evaporation setups:

  1. Vaporization: The target material is first placed into a crucible at the bottom of the vacuum chamber. A heat source (tungsten filament or electron beam) is then used to sublime or boil the target material into a vapor.
  2. Transport from target to substrate: The vaporized target material forms a vapor plume which travels to the substrate, installed directly above the target. Maintaining a stable, high vacuum level ensures the environment is free from contamination, and a mean free path ensures a virtually collision‑free journey of the vapors from the target to the substrate.
  3. Deposition and nucleation: Since the substrate’s surface is at a relatively low temperature, the vapors condense when they come in contact with it. Condensation is followed by nucleation, creating the first thin film layer. This process is carried out until the desired film thickness is reached.

  Thermal evaporation methods

  Thermal evaporation also has subtypes, differentiated by method of vaporizing the target material. Methods include molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), electron beam deposition, flash evaporation and resistive evaporation.

  Common applications

  Thermal evaporation is most often used to deposit electrically conductive metallic layers on solar cells, OLED displays and thin‑film transistors. It is also used in the manufacturing process of aluminum PET films.

  PVD method 2: Sputtering deposition

  Sputtering deposition is a line of sight process like thermal evaporation, however it uses energized gas molecules to deposit thin films on the substrate and provides better step coverage. This method can be used to deposit metals, non‑metals, alloys, and oxides.

  A typical sputtering system consists of the following components:

  • Substrate(s) and target
  • Cathode and anode
  • Mass flow controllers
  • Pressure controller/gate valve
  • Vacuum pump
  • Quartz crystal

  Sputtering is performed at relatively low vacuums of 0 – 0.03 Torr and argon is the most commonly used gas due to its high molecular weight. The three basic steps of sputtering deposition follow:

  1. Vaporization: The target is connected to the cathode, which causes the free electrons to accelerate away from it. These electrons then collide with the argon molecules, knocking electrons from the outermost shells and leaving positively charged argon ions (responsible for the plasma glow). As the argon ions accelerate towards the cathode and collide with the target, they knock off (sputter) target molecules.
  2. Transport from target to substrate: The target molecules absorb a part of the kinetic energy from the argon ions, propelling them towards the substrate and forming a vapor stream. A stable vacuum level is crucial at this stage to ensure a high quality thin film.
  3. Film growth: The sputtered target molecules stick to the substrate and form the thin film coating. The rate of deposition can be optimized by controlling the flow rate of the inert gas.

  Sputtering methods

  Different sputtering processes like radio frequency, DC, pulsed DC, and magnetron sputtering are categorized based on the type of power supply used. A special technique called reactive sputtering is used to when depositing chemical compounds.

  Common applications

  The earliest sputtering application is the production of computer hard disks. Sputtering is now used extensively in integrated circuit processing, production of anti‑reflective or high emissivity film coated glass, cutting tool coatings, and coating of CDs and DVDs.

  Improving pressure control in your deposition setup

  Alicat integrated vacuum controllers are equipped with a dedicated vacuum sensor and control pressure with NIST‑traceable accuracy to ± 0.125% of full scale. These units are built to easily replace the vacuum sensor, controller module, and gate valve in your system. We also offer mass flow controllers specifically made to easily drop into your pre‑existing setup, with 30 ms response times and accuracy to 0.5% of reading.

  Get in touch with an applications engineer and learn more about upgrading your deposition setup to produce high quality, repeatable PVD coatings.

• Alicat Scientific Pressure Controllers Line Extended (Sep 08, 2025)

  Alicat Scientific Pressure Controllers Line Extended

  Metal seals for reduced wetted materials, with a SEMI standard form factor

  Feb 26, 2025

  

  Alicat® Scientific of Tucson, Arizona, expands options for pressure controller users that need metal seals in their processes on the PCX Series. With the expansion, users can limit wetted materials to 316L steel, plus either PCTFE, FFKM, or EPDM—meaning they are compatible with many corrosive gases. The footprints for any flow rate match SEMI equipment standards, making easy work of semiconductor equipment repurposing, refurbishing, and refit.

  Communication options include analog 4‑20mA and others, or digital control and reporting. Digital solutions include MODBUS RTU, several ethernet‑based industrial protocols such as EtherNet/IP and EtherCAT, or the latest low‑cost addition, IO‑Link. The PCX Series pressure controllers are equipped with Alicat’s multivariate LCD display and manual control interface. With strong and reliable performance, the instruments control the pressure of gases from 500 TorrA through 100 PSIA with high leak integrity of 1e‑10 atm cc/sec He external. Accuracy is as good as 0.125% of full scale with the high accuracy option, and repeatability is as good as 0.025% of full scale. The PCX Series product line carries Alicat’s lifetime limited warranty.

  Products