Development of compact gas cluster ion beam (GCIB) equipment and ultra-surface smoothing

GCIB technology has been used for semiconductor, optical and magnetic device fabrications. It has also shown a possibility for nanometer level manufacturing. In recent requirement in materials processing, surface smoothing becomes important in a range of nanometer accuracy. This paper describes development of compact GCIB equipment for surface smoothing of lens molds and cutting tools. For the surface smoothing of WC lens mold and CVD diamond cutting tool, the roughness (Ra) of less than 1 nm has been achieved in a production scale. It has also been shown that the GCIB process could make the smoothing smaller than the grain size in these materials.