Application of a Framestore Datasystem in Imaging SIMS

Abstract

The advances made in UHV SIMS instrumentation (scanned ion probe/quadrupole analyser) have increased analytical capabilities in several areas: depth profiling using high current reactive ion (O₂, Cs) or inert-gas ion probes, with or without oxygen gas flooding, has achieved extremes in depth resolution or detection limits [1], particularly in semiconductor materials; sub-micron spatial resolution using scanned liquid metal field-ion source, LMFIS, probes of Ga, In, Au [2,3] and Cs [4], and the SIMS application of these ions has been demonstrated in elemental imaging, spectral analysis, line scans and depth profiles of a variety of samples including oxide-insulators of multi-layer or fibre structure [4,5] and polymer fibre [6] as well as semiconductor device structures [4,7]; imaging molecular or “STATIC” SIMS on polymer materials has been demonstrated [8] with coincident ion and electron beams (to maintain charge neutrality) while the introduction of neutral fast-atom beams, “FAB”, has made the spectral analysis of all types of insulators as easy as for conductors. The latest addition is the scanned FAB probe [9] which should make molecular imaging of insulators at 5–10 micron resolution a realistic possibility. In pace with these advances in primary probes the collection efficiency of the best quadrupoles has been improved to around the 1% level,so that the potential of SIMS for 3D micro-volume analysis either at the trace-element level or at the major molecular species level is now being realised in UHV.