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Investigation of Rb+ milling rates using an ultracold focused ion beam

MetadataDetails
Publication Date2022-06-02
JournalJournal of Vacuum Science & Technology B Nanotechnology and Microelectronics Materials Processing Measurement and Phenomena
AuthorsSheng Xu, Y. Li, E.J.D. Vredenbregt
InstitutionsEindhoven University of Technology
Citations6
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Several ion source alternatives for current focused ion beam (FIB) systems have been studied to achieve higher brightness, including cold atom ion sources. However, a study of ultracold ions interacting with often used materials is seldom reported. Here, we investigate milling on several typical samples in a prototype ultracold Rb FIB system at 8.5 keV beam energy. For polycrystalline metallic substrates, such as Cu and Au, patterns milled by Rb+ ions are observed to have reduced surface roughness but still high milling rates compared with those milled by Ga+ ions. Rb+ also shows similar sputter rates as 30 keV Ga+ on semiconductor substrates GaAs and InP. Special cases for Rb+ milling show that the Rb+ ion beam has a 2.6Ɨ faster sputter rate on diamond but a 3Ɨ slower sputter rate on Al compared with a normal 30 keV Ga+ ion beam. In general, an Rb+ ion beam is shown to be suitable for nanostructuring of several basic materials.