Transient effects during erosion of WN by deuterium ions studied with the quartz crystal microbalance technique

Abstract

Transient effects during erosion of polycrystalline tungsten-nitride (WN) films by mono-energetic deuterium projectiles are studied using a quartz crystal microbalance technique. The evolution of the mass removal rate of a 360 nm thin WN film under 500 eV/D and 1000 eV/D bombardment is investigated at a temperature of 465 K in situ and in real-time as a function of the deuterium fluence. The measurements are performed at a typical flux of 10 18 m-2 s-1. A strong dependency of the observed mass change rate on the deuterium fluence is found. The mass loss is initially higher than for pure tungsten (W) and drops with fluence, finally reaching the same steady state value as for pure W sputtering. Steady state surface conditions are obtained at a fluence of about 0.2×10 23 D/m² for 500 eV/D and 0.6×10 23 D/m² for 1000 eV/D. SDTrimSP simulations indicate a preferential removal of N and a corresponding W enrichment of the surface.

Fluence dependent changes of surface morphology and sputtering yield of iron: Comparison of experiments with SDTrimSP-2D

“…The measurements have been performed using a highly sensitive quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) developed at TU Wien and described in more detail in [14,15]. This setup is an ideal tool to measure small mass changes and allows in-situ investigation of a dynamic erosion behaviour [6,16].…”

The temperature effect and thickness calibration on the application of quartz crystal microbalances in the study of erosion and deposition of materials

“…With a super-high resolution of about 1 nm in thickness, a quartz crystal microbalance (QMB) based on the piezoelectric effect 7 , has been proposed as an effective tool to make real-time measurements of erosion and deposition patterns of materials in ultra-high vacuum devices, such as fusion devices [1][2] and the ion beam apparatus 3 . However, taking into account the ultra-sensitivity of temperature change resulting from the intense particle flow, the application of QMBs in previous investigations has been restricted in remote cold plasma area with relatively stable temperature work region 4 .…”