A study of fused silica micro/nano patterning by focused-ion-beam

A dual-beam scanning electron microscopy (SEM)/focused-ion-beam (FIB) system was used to pattern fused silica substrates coated with a 15 nm thin Cr layer. The dimensions of fabricated features together with their surface morphology and profiles were investigated by SEM and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The study demonstrated that with the increase of the ion beam fluence the sputtering rate of the fused silica decreased non-linearly. Also, it was found that initially the sputtering rate increased with the increase of the beam current, after reaching a maximum value, it started decreasing when further beam current increment was performed. Compared with unprocessed areas, the surface finish of the features fabricated by FIB exhibited a significant improvement, and the ion fluence influence on the surface roughness of trenches with low aspect ratios could be considered as negligible. Using a fine beam probe, nano-gratings in the form of grooves with a width down to 54 nm and an aspect ratio higher than three were fabricated. The study showed that FIB machining could be an alternative technology to e-beam lithography for producing fused silica templates for UV nanoimprinting.     

Patterning of amorphous and polycrystalline Ni78B14Si8 with a focused-ion-beam

The machining response of amorphous and crystalline Ni₇₈B₁₄Si₈ was investigated when structuring substrates using focused-ion-beam (FIB) milling. In particular, the sputtering yield as a function of the scan speed, and the effects of ion fluence and scan speed on the milled depth were studied. The ion fluence dependent evolution of the cross-sectional profiles of trenches was examined by atomic force microscopy (AFM). When milling amorphous Ni₇₈B₁₄Si₈, it was found that the sputtering yield first decreased with increasing the beam scan speed, then kept constant within the scan speed range, up to 710 nm/s, investigated in this work; it was also found that the milled depth was almost proportional to the ion beam fluence. The patterning of polycrystalline Ni₇₈B₁₄Si₈ resulted in anisotropic milling-rates due to the varying orientation of the grains in the material. The analysis of the profile evolution in both materials indicated that the surface finish of trenches was scan speed, ion beam fluence and scan strategy dependent. The study demonstrated that direct patterning by FIB could be used for producing masters in amorphous Ni-based alloys for injection moulding and hot embossing.     

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Photoinduced Luminescence Blinking and Bleaching in Individual Single‐Walled Carbon Nanotubes

The temporal evolution of photoluminescence in individual single‐walled carbon nanotubes (SWNT) under strong laser irradiation is studied and pronounced blinking and bleaching is observed, caused by photoinduced oxidation that subsequently quenches mobile excitons. The nanotubes are isolated with sodium cholate and spun onto either a glass or mica surface. Their bleaching behavior is investigated for variable laser intensities in air and argon atmosphere. The decay rate for luminescence bleaching generally increases with higher laser intensity, however saturating on mica substrates, which is attributed to limited availability of oxygen in the vicinity of the nanotubes. Step‐like events in the luminescence time traces corresponding to single oxidation events are analyzed regarding relative step height and suggest an exciton diffusion range of about 105 nm.     

Double layer in ionic liquids: The nature of the camel shape of capacitance

Monte Carlo simulations of a model ionic liquid show that if ions have charged heads and neutral counterparts, the latter give rise to the camel shape of the voltage dependence of the double layer capacitance. Neutral ‘tails’ of ions play the role of latent voids that can be replaced by charged groups via rotations and translations of ions. This provides extra degrees of freedom for the field-induced charge rearrangements in the double layer which results in the peculiar double-hump capacitance profile.     

Electromagnetic field with induced massive term: Case with scalar field

We consider an interacting system of massless scalar and electromagnetic fields, with the Lagrangian explicitly depending on the electromagnetic potentials, i.e., interaction with broken gauge invariance. The Lagrangian for interaction is chosen in such a way that the electromagnetic field equation acquires an additional term, which in some cases is proportional to the vector potential of the electromagnetic field. This equation can be interpreted as the equation of motion of photon with induced nonzero rest-mass. This system of interacting fields is considered within the scope of Bianchi type-I (BI) cosmological model. It is shown that, as a result of interaction the isotropization process of the expansion takes place.