A Simplified Model of Planetary Chemical Vapor Deposition Reactors

Abstract

A simplified model for planetary chemical vapor deposition reactors is proposed and used to compute deposition species mole fraction and deposition rate in the reactor depletion zone. First, the modeling and optimization work performed in the literature is reviewed and their representative deposition rate profiles are extracted. Afterwards, several simplifying assumptions are applied to derive the reactor modeling equation, and the eigenfunction expansion solution is subsequently computed using a previously developed MATLAB object-oriented computational framework. The simulation result for the deposition profile is improved by modifying the inlet boundary condition, and is then compared with the previously published profiles. The MATLAB optimization toolbox is used to find the optimal deposition profile giving the best match with the published, detailed simulator profiles. Finally, an evaluation of the model consistency with the published results is given.