Design, Fabrication, and Characterization of a Micro Vapor-Jet Vacuum Pump

A microelectromechanical system (MEMS) vapor-jet pump for vacuum generation in miniaturized analytical systems, e.g., micro-mass-spectrometers (Wapelhorst, E., Hauschild, J., and Mueller, J., 2005, “A Fully Integrated Micro Mass Spectrometer,” in Fifth Workshop on Harsh-Environment Mass Spectrometry;Hauschild, J., Wapelhorst, E., and Mueller, J., 2005, “A Fully Integrated Plasma Electron Source for Micro Mass Spectrometers,” in Ninth International Conference on Miniaturized Systems for Chemistry and Life Sciences (μTAS), pp. 476–478), is presented. A high velocity nitrogen or water vapor jet is used for vacuum generation. Starting from atmospheric pressure, a high throughput of more than $23ml∕min$ and an ultimate pressure of $495mbars$ were obtained with this new type of micropump. An approach for the full integration of all components of the pump is presented and validated by experimental results. The pump is fabricated from silicon and glass substrates using standard MEMS fabrication techniques including deep reactive ion etching, trichlorosilane molecular vapor deposition, and metal-assisted chemical etching for porous silicon fabrication. Micromachined pressure sensors based on the Pirani principle have been developed and integrated into the pump for monitoring.