Structure and chemical composition of LiB₃O₅ surfaces

Abstract

The electronic and structural properties of LiB 3 O 5 (LBO) surfaces have been studied by X-ray photoemission spectroscopy (XPS) and reflectance high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED). The as-grown (110) crystal face and mechanically polished (001) surfaces have been investigated comparatively. Electronic structure of LBO has been determined on as-grown (110) crystal face previously cleaned by chemical etching with RHEED control. The correlation of valence band structure and measured binding energies with earlier reported results has been discussed. Core-level spectroscopy reveals strong enriching of mechanically polished LBO surface with carbon, when nanodiamond powder is used as an abrasive. So high carbon level as C:B=0.7 has been observed at the surface while the ratio Li:B:O remains according to LBO chemical composition. The association of LBO Kikuchi-lines with strong background has been shown by RHEED analysis of the surface. Thus, the polished LBO surface constitutes a high structure quality LBO with the inclusions of some amorphous carbon compound.

Structural and spectroscopic properties of new noncentrosymmetric self-activated borate Rb3EuB6O12 with B5O10 units

“…Among the most attractive features of borate crystals such key characteristics as their transparency in deep UV range, high optical damage threshold combined with appropriate nonlinearity, and suitable chemical stability of optical surface should be pointed, and they define wide applications of borate materials in modern laser optics and nanophotonics [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. Within borate matrices, boron ions can be either three-or four-fold coordinated, and the combination of BO4 and BO3 units produces large variety of crystal structures with differing properties [12][13][14][15].…”

Mechanical properties of single crystalline and glassy lithium triborate

“…Therefore, the study of properties governing the applicability of LBO single crystals is important. A number of papers devoted to optical properties [2,3,[8][9][10], electrical conductivity [11], thermal expansion [1,6,[11][12][13], heat capacity [14], phase relationships [15,16], pyro- [6], piezo- [6,17] and dielectric constants [6,11], structural (bulk [1,18] as well as surface [19]), hygroscopic [7] and growth [5,20,21] properties including defects [20] of LBO have been published. Moreover, the electron density has been measured [22,23].…”