Within substrate processing equipment, a gate valve may be utilized, for example, to control pressure within a process chamber and/or to control the flow of reactive species, process gases, byproducts from a process, or the like from a processing volume of the process chamber. Gate valves typically include a gate disposed in a gate valve body that is selectively movable between two positions—a closed position where the gate seals an opening in the gate valve and an open position where gases may flow through the opening in the gate valve. A throttling gate valve can move to any position between the open and closed positions. Unfortunately, however, such gases can undesirably flow into a recess of the gate valve body where the gate is disposed when in an at least partially open position and may deposit particulate matter in the recess of the valve body or on the gate. Such deposits can undesirably break free, for example, by a pressure change in the process chamber, by vibration due to operation of the gate valve, or the like, which can lead to undesirable contamination of a substrate being processed in the chamber.
The inventors have observed that conventional methods of limiting contamination and deposits on portions of gate valve bodies are inadequate to provide the reduced level of contaminants required by some processes.
Accordingly, the inventors have provided an improved gate valve.