Study of required conditions to limit the dielectric charging phenomenon when measuring the electron emission yield from thin dielectric layers

Abstract

The electron emission yield of materials is an important quantity to be determined in various fields of physics. Among them, dielectric materials have a strong ability to retain charges and remain charged when submitted to electrical field, in particular when irradiated by electron beam. Without the use of specific measurement methodology, experimental investigation of dielectric materials may lead to an inaccurate measurement of the total electron emission yield (TEEY). This paper shows that a particular attention should be paid to the pulse duration of the incident electron beam and to hysteresis effects induced by charge trapping.