Precise Radiometry: Some Recent Aspects of Fruitful Interaction with Atomic Physics

Modern radiometric analytics demands a complex consideration of nuclear and electron shell processes, if more pretentious aims are envisaged. As an example the small variation of decay rates of radionuclides presents possibilities for information on chemical situations of decaying atoms. In principle this phenomenon is well known since many years, but now the situation is such that, e.g. in ^99mTc internal conversion, a full agreement of the difficult experiments and the respective theory was established. The secondary emission of X-rays as a consequence of high excitation of electron shells in combination with nuclear transitions supplies another example for a methodical progress of radiometry. Investigations on ⁵¹Cr as an electron capture nuclide have shown that chemically induced variations of the K_α to K_β X-ray intensity ratio is at least qualitatively understood.     

Electron temperature and ion density measurements in a glow discharge of an Ar–N2 mixture

A DC glow discharge produced in N₂ gas can generate several species that are important in different applications, such as the modification of surface properties of materials. A low-pressure glow discharge apparatus was used for the the analysis of the Ar–N₂ mixture at a total pressure of 2.0 Torr, a power of 20 W and 40 l/min flow rate of gases. The emission bands were measured in the wavelength range of 200–1100 nm. The principal elements are N₂, N ₂⁺ and Ar I. The electron temperature was found in the range of 1.72–2.08 eV, and the ion density was in the order of 10¹⁰ cm^?3.     

Sputtering of SiC with low energy He and Ar ions under grazing incidence

The effect of low energy sputtering under grazing incidence upon the surface composition of SiC was investigated by Auger electron spectroscopy. The energy of the sputtering projectiles (He, Ar) varied from 200 to 1500?eV. Peak shifts to the higher energies with increasing argon ion energy were observed for all silicon and carbon Auger transitions. These shifts were explained by enhanced damage of the surface region within the sampling depth of the Auger electrons. The insensitivity of the Auger peak position to the energy of helium ions indicates that the damage state in the surface region does not change with the increasing energy of helium ions. An increase of the carbon concentration with the decrease of the argon energy was observed. The experiments were accompanied by dynamic Monte Carlo simulations by the TRIDYN code.     

Effect of hydrogen introduced by channelling implantation on the microstructures in silicon wafers

High-resolution transmission electron microscopy has been employed to study the platelet defects before annealing and the extended defects generated by annealing in the channelling-implanted silicon wafers. It has been found that there apparently appear platelet defects of quite great size and spacing at the maximum projected range of ions (R _max). Additionally, the cracks induced by annealing at 550 °C are generated around R _max instead of the average projected range of ions (R _p) as it is in the non-channelling-implanted samples. Moreover, after annealing at 1000 °C, cracks without branches and cavities arranging in a single array, different from the forked cracks and cavities arranged in several arrays in the non-channelling-implanted samples, are observed in the channelling-implanted silicon wafers. It is suggested that those special microstructure characteristics are ascribed to the channelling effect of implanted hydrogen ions.     

Theoretical investigations of the EPR parameters and local structure for Cu2+ in BeO

The electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) parameters (the anisotropic g factors, the hyperfine structure parameters and the quadrupole coupling constant Q) and local structure for Cu²⁺ in BeO are theoretically investigated from the perturbation formulas of these parameters for a 3d⁹ ion under trigonally distorted tetrahedra. The ligand orbital and spin-orbit coupling contributions are included in the basis of the cluster approach, in view of the strong covalency of the [CuO₄]^6? cluster. From the calculations, the impurity Cu²⁺ is suggested not to occupy exactly the ideal Be²⁺ site but to suffer a slight inward displacement (≈0.024 Å) toward the ligand triangle along the C₃ axis. The theoretical EPR parameters show good agreement with the experimental data.     

TEM study of ion implanted GaAs after pulsed electron beam annealing

Abstract

(001) GaAs single crystals were implanted with 150 keV Cr⁺ ions using a dose of 5 × 10¹⁵ ions cm^?2. The amorphized surface layers were subjected to pulsed electron beam annealing at energy densities in the range 0–1.3 J cm^?2. A detailed TEM investigation of the damaged and annealed surface layer was conducted. These observations were correlated with backscattering results.     

High-pressure torsion applied to nickel single crystals

Nickel single crystals with different crystallographic orientations were deformed by high-pressure torsion. Special attention is devoted to examining the evolution of the micro-texture and microstructure. The initial crystal orientation was found to have a significant effect on the mechanical hardening and evolution of micro-texture at low and medium equivalent strains, whereas at very high strains no effect of the initial orientation was observed and the behaviour was very similar to a polycrystal. The evolution of micro-texture is in good qualitative agreement with the full constrained Taylor model. At very high equivalent strains the initial crystal orientation has no influence on micro-texture. At such strains, the hardening, the refinement of the structure and the texture reaches a saturation. The final micro-texture is explained by the change from one preferred crystallographic orientation to another.     

Theoretical calculations of spin-Hamiltonian parameters and defect structures for Cu2+ in trigonally-distorted tetrahedral sites of ZnO and GaN crystals

The spin-Hamiltonian (SH) parameters (g factors g _//, g ⊥ and hyperfine structure constants ⁶³ A _//, ⁶³ A ⊥, ⁶⁵ A _//, ⁶⁵ A ⊥) for Cu²⁺ ions in the trigonally-distorted tetrahedral sites of ZnO and GaN crystals are calculated from a complete diagonalization (of energy matrix) method (CDM) based on a two spin-orbit parameter model for d ⁹ ions in trigonal symmetry. In the method, the Zeeman and hyperfine interaction terms are added to the Hamiltonian in the conventional CDM. The calculated results are in good agreement with the experimental values. The calculated SH parameters are also compared with those using the traditional diagonalization method or perturbation method only within the ² T ₂ term. It appears that, for exact calculations of SH parameters of d ⁹ ions in trigonal tetrahedral clusters in crystals, the present CDM is preferable to the traditional diagonalization method or perturbation method within the ² T ₂ term. The local structures of Cu²⁺ centers (which differ from the corresponding structure in the host crystal) in ZnO : Cu²⁺ and GaN : Cu²⁺ are obtained from the calculations. The results are discussed.