Atom probe specimen preparation

Thompson, G.B., Miller, M.K., Fraser, H.L. (2004) Some aspects of atom probe specimen preparation and analysis of thin film materials. Ultramicroscopy, 100, 25-34. 

Miller, M., Russell, K. (2007) Atom probe specimen preparation with a dual beamSEM/FTB miller. Ultramicroscopy, 707,761-766. 

FIGURE 40.26 Schematic of a cut-out sample preparation by FIB. Reprinted from Saxey, D.W., Caimey, IM., McGrouther, D., Houma, T., Ringer, S.P. (2007) Atom probe specimen fabrication methods using a dual FIB/SEM. Ultramicroscopy, 107(9), 756-760. Copyright (2007), with permission from Elsevier. 

The oldest microscopy technique for materials analysis was optical microscopy. Even to this day, for feature sizes above 1 pm, this is one of the most popular tools. For smaller features, electron microscopy techniques such as scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) are the tools of choice. A third family of microscopy includes scanning probe tools such as scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). In these relatively recent techniques, sample preparation concerns are of minor importance compared to other problems, such as vibration isolation and processing of atomically sharp probes. Therefore, the latter techniques are not discussed here. This chapter is aimed at introducing the user to general specimen preparation steps involved in optical and electron microscopy [3 7], which to date are the most common... 

Both the transmission electron microscope and the scanning probe microscope (particularly the atomic force microscope) are the highest-resolution-imaging devices available for biochemical research. While knowledge of the instruments is important, the selection of appropriate methods of specimen preparation and the correct execution of those methods are critical for accurate ultrastructural data. In fact, use of more than one method can be quite desirable, especially if alternative methods of data corroboration are not available. 

It should be noted that most of the microstructural data to be presented rely on different characterization techniques using electron microscopy in combination with other scanning probe microscopy techniques, e.g. scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The details of specimen preparation and the analysis techniques of electron microscopy are described in other chapters of this book and are therefore not further covered in this chapter. The references provided in the chapter are merely a selection, since the field of research is vivid and the number of publications is large. The goal is to show the salient features which can be further explored by use of the referenced literature. 

FIGURE 40.25 Sample preparation by FIB with a region isolated by a moat-type removal of surrounding material. Reprinted from Thompson, K., Lawrence, D., Larson, D.J., Olson, ID., Kelly, T.F., Gorman, B. (2006) In situ site-specific specimen preparation for atom probe tomography. Ultramicroscopy, 107(2-3), 131-139. Copyright (2006), with permission from Elsevier. 

Henjered, A., Norden, H. (1983) A controlled specimen preparation technique for interface studies with atom-probe field-ion microscopy./owma/ of Physics E Scientific Instruments, 16, 617-619. 

Cairney, I, Saxey, D., McGrouther, D., Ringer, S. (2007) Site-specific specimen preparation for atom probe tomography of grain boundaries. Physica B Condensed Matter, 394,267-269. 

Larson, D.I, Foord, D.T., Petford-Long, A.K., Cerezo, A., Smith, G.D.W. (1999) Focused ion-beam specimen preparation for atom probe field-ion microscopy characterization of multilayer film structures. Nanotechnology, 10, 45-50. 

Miller, M.K., Russell, K.F., Thompson, K., Alvis, R., Larson, D.J. (2007) Review of atom probe FIB-based specimen preparation methods. Microscopy and Microanalysis, 13,428-436. 

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