Ultra Pure Metals for High Technology Applications

Material Matters Volume 2 Article 4

The primary focus of our manufacturing facility in Urbana, Illinois, USA is on the purification of inorganics and metals for a variety of high technology applications. Our capabilities in the area of metals purification utilize several routes to produce some of the purest alkali earth and rare earth metals in the world. These techniques can also be used in the manufacture of alloys and other materials for your research or commercial requirements.

Our proprietary techniques allow us to manufacture barium, calcium, strontium, and magnesium with trace metal purities up to 4N (99.99%). We also manufacture rare earth metals in purities exceeding 4N through a number of different high temperature routes.

One area of customization has focused on the manufacture of prepackaged Molecular Beam Epitaxy (MBE) crucibles for use in thin film manufacturing of advanced materials. We have successfully manufactured high purity barium, calcium, and strontium (as well as other high purity metals) and melted the material into an MBE crucible. This allows for increased loading in the crucible as well as significantly reduced outgassing of the materials in the MBE vacuum chamber.

Rare earth metal foils are used in thermal and electron beam (e-beam) evaporation processes for coatings and thin films via physical vapor deposition (PVD). The low-temperature e-beam technique is particularly suited for applications such as fuel cells and solar panels. The rare earth metal foils can also be used in the preparation of alloys and composites that contain highly volatile components (Ca, Mg, etc.).