Correlation between plasma glow intensity distribution and sputtering profile in dc magnetron discharge

The correlation between the plasma glow intensity distribution and the target sputtering profile in an axially symmetric unbalanced dc magnetron discharge with copper cathode in argon is studied. At high pressures the argon atom and ion emission intensities are in good agreement with a sputtering profile. In case of low pressures, a satisfactory agreement is only for the ion emission. The best estimates of the sputtering profile can be obtained from the argon ion emission distribution at not too low pressures.