Atom probe tomography spatial reconstruction: Status and directions

Larson, David J.; Gault, Baptiste; Geiser, B.; Geuser, F. de; Vurpillot, F.

doi:10.1016/j.cossms.2013.09.002

Cited by 135 publications

(80 citation statements)

References 87 publications

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“…Therefore, the evaporation condition is chosen to keep homogeneous ionization for the optimal spatial information [15]. This applies to solid materials whose spatial information is focused on.…”

Section: B Molecular System: Amino Acid( L-tryptophan) Supported On mentioning

confidence: 99%

Scanning Atom Probe Analysis Alternately Triggered by Voltage and Laser Pulse

Taniguchi

Nishikawa

2016

e-J. Surf. Sci. Nanotech.

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Voltage pulse which has been used from the establishment of atom probe (AP) in the 1960's is going to be replaced by short pulsed laser with high repetition rate in the nanometer scale characterization of materials by 3D-AP. Scanning Atom Probe (SAP) has a miniature electrode for acceptance of non-needle shaped specimens which allows us to analyze non-solid materials which are common in chemistry. The selectivity and the adaptability of voltage pulse and laser pulse are not clear in the non-bulk materials which are common in chemistry but not familiar in AP field. Two types of trigger, voltage pulse and laser pulse, were applied alternately to the identical sample to perform direct comparison. Tungsten tip, conventional material in AP, and amino acid (L-Tryptophan) supported on carbon nanotube were chosen as candidates for this analysis. The dual trigger system successfully worked on metallic sample and the selectivity of the ion species and adaptability were demonstrated on molecular system.

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Section: B Molecular System: Amino Acid( L-tryptophan) Supported On mentioning

confidence: 99%

Scanning Atom Probe Analysis Alternately Triggered by Voltage and Laser Pulse

Taniguchi

Nishikawa

2016

e-J. Surf. Sci. Nanotech.

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“…(Da Costa et al, 2005;Jagutzki et al, 2002 flight is converted into a mass-to-charge ratio (Müller et al, 1968) usually displayed in the form of a histogram, the mass spectrum, that is optimized using methods outlined by Sebastian et al (2001). The impact position is used, assuming a simple projection law, to build a 3D point cloud of the analyzed volume of material (Bas et al, 1995;Gault et al, 2011b;Larson et al, 2013), as illustrated in the case of an Alalloy in Fig. 2 (Sha et al, 2011).…”

Section: Data Treatment and Reconstructionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Processing of the data translates the time-of-flight into a mass-to-charge ratio, and the position is used to build a tomographic, atomically resolved image of the evaporated volume (Bas et al, 1995;Larson et al, 2013), represented as a point-cloud where every point is an atom that has been elementally identified and repositioned with a high degree of precision (Gault et al, 2010b).…”

Section: Introduction To Atom Probe Tomographymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Admittedly, the technique has drawbacks (i.e., small sampled volume, limited sensitivity, etc.) and suffers from a range of artifacts (Blum et al, 2016;Gault et al, 2016;Larson et al, 2013), most of which are related to a combination of many complex physical processes that can take place concomitantly or successively over the course of an atom probe experiment. The community is now working to understand some of the key issues that limit the performance and applicability of the technique to increasingly complex materials (Kelly et al, 2014;Silaeva et al, 2013).…”

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confidence: 99%

“…The impact position is used, assuming a simple projection law, to build a 3D point cloud of the analyzed volume of material (Bas et al, 1995;Gault et al, 2011b;Larson et al, 2013), as illustrated in the case of an Alalloy in Fig. 2 (Sha et al, 2011).…”

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confidence: 99%

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A Brief Overview of Atom Probe Tomography Research

Gault

2016

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Atom probe tomography (APT) has been fast rising in prominence over the past decade as a key tool for nanoscale analytical characterization of a range of materials systems. APT provides three-dimensional mapping of the atom distribution in a small volume of solid material. The technique has evolved, with the incorporation of laser pulsing capabilities, and, combined with progress in specimen preparation, APT is now able to analyse a very range of materials, beyond metals and alloys that used to be its core applications. The present article aims to provide an overview of the technique, providing a brief historical perspective, discussing recent progress leading to the state-of-the-art, some perspectives on its evolution, with targeted examples of applications.Key Words: Atom probe tomography, Field evaporation, Materials characterization, Microscopy, Nanoscale Gault B 118The specimen is progressively destroyed, almost atom-byatom, and the atom probe microscope collects the timeof-flight and impact position of each ion. Processing of the data translates the time-of-flight into a mass-to-charge ratio, and the position is used to build a tomographic, atomically resolved image of the evaporated volume (Bas et al., 1995;Larson et al., 2013), represented as a point-cloud where every point is an atom that has been elementally identified and repositioned with a high degree of precision (Gault et al., 2010b). INSTRUMENTAL DESIGNEarly designs of the technique, usually referred to as atomprobe field ion microscopes or one-dimensional (1D) atom probe (Miller, 2000;Müller et al., 1968), had a very narrow field-of-view and really only provided linear compositional measurement in the depth of the sample, within a region of interest located by field-ion microscopy (Brenner & Goodman, 1971). APT was truly enabled by the implementation of position-sensitive, time-resolved particle detectors by Cerezo et al. (1988) followed by Blavette et al. (1993), and modern microscopes are equipped with delayline detectors (Da Costa et al., 2005; Jagutzki et al., 2002). The incorporation of micro-channel plates (MCPs) in the design of such detectors, to convert the impact of a single-ion into a cascade of up to millions of electrons, limits the efficiency approximately to the open area of the MCPs, so between 50%~80%. The MCPs are operated in saturated mode, which ensures almost no mass or atomic number sensitivity for ions in the range of 2~3 kV up to 15~20 kV up to several hundreds of Da, and the loss of ions is therefore nonspecific and assumed to be random and hence not affecting the technique's capacity to precisely measure the elemental composition. In order to increase the mass resolution of the technique, limited by the energy spread of the emitted ions, reflectron-lenses were fitted onto atom probes (Bémont et al., 2003;Cerezo et al., 1998;Panayi, 2006). A reflectron acts as an electrostatic mirror: ions penetrate inside a region containing a well-defined electric field in which ions are progressively slowed down until they are returne...

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