Patent ID: 8016944

Claim:
A plasma reactor for producing nanoparticles, comprising: a plasma reactor chamber having a length extending in a flow direction from an inlet to an outlet; a source of a continuous precursor monomer gas flow through the plasma reactor chamber along the length of the plasma reactor chamber from the inlet to the outlet which includes a semiconductor containing precursor monomer, the source coupled to the inlet of the plasma reactor chamber; at least two electrodes, the at least two electrodes arranged in the flow through the plasma reactor chamber perpendicular to the flow direction and spaced apart a distance along the length of the plasma reactor, and the at least two electrodes capacitively couple to the precursor monomer gas in the plasma rector chamber and wherein the gas flow is through the at least two electrodes; and a high frequency voltage source capacitively coupled to the at least two electrodes which applies a high voltage therebetween and responsively continuously dissociates the semiconductor containing precursor monomer in the plasma reactor chamber to provide precursor species that nucleate and grow into semiconductor nanoparticles, wherein; the precursor is primarily converted into nonagglomerated semiconductor nanoparticles and the nanoparticles are carried out of the reactor through the outlet in a continuous fashion.