• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.498-498
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• 2013

Atmospheric Pressure Plasmas have pioneered a new field of plasma for biomedical application bridging plasma physics and biology. Biological and medical applications of plasmas have attracted considerable attention due to promising applications in medicine such as electro-surgery, dentistry, skin care and sterilization of heat-sensitive medical instruments [1]. Traditional approaches using electronic devices have limits in heating, high voltage shock, and high current shock for patients. It is a great demand for plasma medical industrial acceptance that the plasma generation device should be compact, inexpensive, and safe for patients. Microwave-excited micro-plasma has the highest feasibility compared with other types of plasma sources since it has the advantages of low power, low voltage, safety from high-voltage shock, electromagnetic compatibility, and long lifetime due to the low energy of striking ions [2]. Recent experiment [2] shows three-log reduction within 180-s treatment of S. mutans with a low-power palm-size microwave power module for biomedical application. Experiments using microwave plasma are discussed. This low-power palm-size microwave power module board includes a power amplifier (PA) chip, a phase locked loop (PLL) chip, and an impedance matching network. As it has been a success, more compact-size module is needed for the portability of microwave devices and for the various medical applications of microwave plasma source. For the plasma generator, a 1.35-GHz coaxial transmission line resonator (CTLR) [3] is used. The way of reducing the size and enhancing the performances of the module is examined.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.373-375
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• 2006

$CF_4$ gas is one of the most common chemicals used for dry etching in semiconductor manufacturing processes. For application to the etching process and environmental control, the low-pressure inductively coupled plasma (LP-ICP) was employed to obtain the spectrum of $CF_4$ gas. In terms of the analysis of the spectra, trace CF radical by A-X and B-X transitions was detected. The other $CF_x$ radicals, such as $CF_2$ and $CF_3$, were not seen in this experiment whereas strong C and $C_2$ emissions, dissociation products of $CF_4$ gas, were observed.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers C
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• v.53 no.3
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• pp.133-136
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• 2004

Low-Pressure inductively coupled RF discharge sources have important industrial applications mainly because they can provide a high-density electrodeless plasma source with low ion energy and low power loss. In an inductive discharge, the RF power is coupled to the plasma by an electromagnetic interaction with the current flowing in a coil. In this paper, the experiments have been focussed on the electric characteristic and carried out using a single Langmuir probe. The internal electric characteristics of inductively coupled Ar RF discharge at 13.56(MHz) have been measured over a wide range of power at gas pressure ranging from 1∼70(mTorr).

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.02a
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• pp.179-179
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• 2012

Low pressure radio-frequency glow discharges are investigated using theoretical modeling and various experimental diagnostic methods. In the calculations, global models and transformer models are developed to understand the chemical kinetics as well as the electrical properties such as the effective collision frequency, the heating mechanism and the power transferred to the plasma electrons. In addition, Boltzmann equation solver is used to compensate the effect of the electron energy distribution function (EEDF) shape in the global model, and the general expression of energy balance for non-Maxwellian electrons is developed. In the experiments, a number of traditional plasma diagnostic methods are used to compare with calculated results such as Langmuir probe, optical emission spectroscopy (OES), optical absorption spectroscopy (OAS) and two-photon absorption laser-induced fluorescence (TALIF). These theoretical and experimental methods are applied to understand several interesting phenomena in low pressure ICP discharges. The chemical and physical properties of low pressure ICP discharges are described and the applications of these methods are discussed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.08a
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• pp.155.1-155.1
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• 2013

The goals of this study are to elucidate the plasma effects on DNA molecules to apply some plasma based applications and also to find out the mechanisms of plasma-induced DNA damage in biomolecule. Nonthermal atmospheric pressure plasma has much potential for medical, agricultural and food applications for the future. The atmospheric pressure plasma jet (APPJ) contains radicals, charged particles, low energy electrons, excited molecules and UV light. It has been started doing experiments using APPJ at the early 21th. And some recent results showed that APPJ has a possibility to apply to new fields like mentioned above. But it is kind of at the very early stages of plasma based application. It is definitely necessary much of theoretical and experimental studies to further understanding to use nonthermal atmospheric pressure plasma in biomedical, agriculture and food parts. Here we introduce a new experimental system to study plasma effects on biomolecules. And we will show some recent results of LEE-induced DNA damage using electron irradiation apparatus under ultra-high vacuum.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.195.1-195.1
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• 2016

Currently, as Plasma application is expanded to the industrial and medical industrial, low temperature plasma applications became important. Especially in medical and biology, many researchers have studied about generated radical species in atmospheric pressure low temperature plasma directly adapted to human body. Therefore, so measurement their plasma parameter is very important work and is widely studied all around world. One of the plasma parameters is electron density and it is closely relative to radical production through the plasma source. some kinds of method to measuring the electron density are Thomson scattering spectroscopy and Millimeter-wave transmission measurement. But most methods have very expensive cost and complex configuration to composed of experiment system. We selected Michelson interferometer system which is very cheap and simple to setting up, so we tried to measuring electron density by laser interferometer with laser beam chopping module for measurement of temporal phase difference in plasma jet. To measuring electron density at atmospheric pressure Ar plasma jet, we obtained the temporal phase shift signal of interferometer. Phase difference of interferometer can occur because of change by refractive index of electron density in plasma jet. The electron density was able to estimate with this phase difference values by using physical formula about refractive index change of external electromagnetic wave in plasma. Our guiding laser used Helium-Neon laser of the centered wavelength of 632 nm. We installed chopper module which can make a 4kHz pulse laser signal at the laser front side. In this experiment, we obtained more exact synchronized phase difference between with and without plasma jet than reported data at last year. Especially, we found the phase difference between time range of discharge current. Electron density is changed from Townsend discharge's electron bombardment, so we observed the phase difference phenomenon and calculated the temporal electron density by using phase shift. In our result, we suggest that the electron density have approximately range between 1014~ 1015 cm-3 in atmospheric pressure Ar plasma jet.

• Applied Science and Convergence Technology
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.23-25
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• 2018

With respect to the electrode structure and the discharge characteristics, the atmospheric pressure plasma sheet of a thin polyimide film is introduced in this study; here, the flexible plasma device of a dielectric-barrier discharge with the ground electrode and the high-voltage electrode formulated on each surface of a polyimide film whose thickness is approximately $100{\mu}m$, that is operated with a sinusoidal voltage at a frequency of 25 kHz and a low voltage from 1 kV to 2 kV is used. The streamer discharge is appeared along the cross-sectional boundary line between two electrodes at the ignition stage, and the plasma is diffused on the dielectric-layer surface over the high-voltage electrode. In the development of a plasma sheet with thin dielectric films, the avoidance of the insulation breakdown and the reduction of the leakage current have a direct influence on the low-voltage operation.

• International Journal of Oral Biology
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• v.39 no.4
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• pp.187-192
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• 2014

Nonthermal atmospheric pressure plasma has attracted great interest for biomedical applications. The plasma consists of charged particles, radicals, and a strong electric field as the fourth state of matter. This study evaluated the change in the surface roughness after tooth bleaching by plasma in combination with a low concentration (15%) of carbamide peroxide, specifically whether the application of plasma produced detriments, such as demineralization and structural change, with the goal of efficient and safe tooth bleaching. After being combined with plasma and 15% carbamide peroxide, the hydroxyapatite surface was significantly smoother with a low roughness average value. Tooth bleaching with 15% carbamide peroxide alone produced an irregular surface and increased the surface roughness with high roughness average value. Tooth bleaching with plasma resulted in no significant variations in hydroxyapatite in terms of change in surface roughness and surface topography. The application of tooth bleaching with plasma is not deleterious to dental hard tissue, implicating it as a safe tooth bleaching technique.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2014.02a
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• pp.218.1-218.1
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• 2014

In order to measure the absolute plasma density, various probes are proposed and investigated and microwave probes are widely used for its advantages (Insensitivity to thin non-conducting material deposited by processing plasmas, High reliability, Simple process for determination of plasma density, no complicate assumptions and so forth). There are representative microwave probes such as the cutoff probe, the hairpin probe, the impedance probe, the absorption probe and the plasma transmission probe. These probes utilize the microwave interactions with the plasma-sheath and inserted structure (probe), but frequency range used by each probe and specific mechanisms for determining the plasma density for each probe are different. In the recent studies, behaviors of each microwave probe with respect to the plasma parameters of the plasma density, the pressure (the collision frequency), and the sheath width is abundant and reasonably investigated, whereas relative diagnostic characteristics of the probes by a comparative study is insufficient in spite of importance for comprehensive applications of the probes. However, experimental comparative study suffers from spatially different plasma characteristics in the same discharge chamber, a low-reproducibility of ignited plasma for an uncertainty in external discharge parameters (the power, the pressure, the flow rate and so forth), impossibility of independently control of the density, the pressure, and the sheath width as well as expensive and complicate experimental setup. In this paper, various microwave probes are simulated by finite-different time-domain simulation and the error between the input plasma density in FDTD simulations and the measured that by the unique microwave spectrums of each probe is obtained under possible conditions of plasma density, pressure, and sheath width for general low-temperature plasmas. This result shows that the each probe has an optimum applicable plasma condition and reliability of plasma density measurement using the microwave probes can be improved by the complementary use of each probe.

• Medical Lasers
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.74-79
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• 2019

Periorbital melasma is often refractory to treatment and highly associated with rebound hyperpigmentation or mottled hypopigmentation after laser treatment in Asian patients. In this report, we describe 2 patients with cluster-1 periorbital melasma and 1 patient with cluster-2 periorbital melasma who experienced remarkable clinical improvements after microwave-generated, atmospheric-pressure, non-thermal nitrogen plasma treatments. All patients exhibited limited clinical responses after combination treatments with topical bleaching agents, systemic oral tranexamic acid, and low-fluenced Q-switched neodymium (Nd):yttrium-aluminum-garnet (YAG) lasers. Low-energy nitrogen plasma treatment at 0.75 J elicited remarkable clinical improvement in the periorbital melasma lesions without post-laser therapy rebound hyperpigmentation and mottled hypopigmentation. We deemed that a single pass of nitrogen plasma treatment at 0.75 J induces mild microscopic thermal tissue coagulation and modification within the epidermis while preserving the integrity of the basement membrane in patients with periorbital melasma. Accordingly, nitrogen plasma-induced dermal tissue regeneration could play a role in the treatment of melasma lesions.