Epitaxy: the motion picture

The engineering of many modern electronic devices demands control over a crystal down to the thickness of a single layer of atoms—and future demands will be even more challenging. Such control is achieved by the method of crystal growth known as epitaxy, and that makes this method the subject of intense study. More than that, recent advances are revolutionizing our knowledge of how surfaces grow. In fact, growing surfaces show a beautifully rich variety of phenomena, many of which are only now beginning to be uncovered. In the past few years many surface imaging techniques have been used to give us a close look at how crystals grow—while they are growing. The purpose of this article will be to illustrate some of the ways real surfaces grow and change as revealed by some of the latest in situ microscopic imaging technologies.

It is often said that crystal growth is more of an art than a science. Here we will show that it is emphatically both.     

A high-current electron beam ion trap as an on-line charge breeder for the high precision mass measurement TITAN experiment

The precision of atomic mass measurements in a Penning trap is directly proportional to the charge state q of the ion and, hence, can be increased by using highly charged ions (HCI). For this reason, charge breeding with an electron beam ion trap (EBIT) is employed at TRIUMF’s Ion Trap for Atomic and Nuclear science (TITAN) on-line facility in Vancouver, Canada. By bombarding the injected and trapped singly charged ions with an intense beam of electrons, the charge state of the ions is rapidly increased inside the EBIT. To be compatible with the on-line requirements of short-lived isotopes, very high electron beam current densities are needed. The TITAN EBIT includes a 6 Tesla superconducting magnet and is designed to have electron beam currents and energies of up to 5 A and 60 keV, respectively. Once operational at full capacity, most species can be bred into a He-like configuration within tens of ms. Subsequently, the HCI are extracted, pass a Wien filter to reduce isobaric contamination, are cooled, and injected into a precision Penning trap for mass measurement. We will present the first results and current status of the TITAN EBIT, which has recently been moved to TRIUMF after assembly and commissioning at the Max-Planck-Institute (MPI) for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Germany.     

Determination of iphosphamide and seven metabolites in blood plasma,as stable trifluoroacetyl derivatives,by electron capture chemical ionization GC-MS

A method is described for the determination of the antitumor agent iphosphamide and seven of its metabolites in the plasma of cancer patients by multiple ion monitoring (MIM) GC-MS, mainly using the electron capture chemical ionization mode, of stable methyl and/or trifluoroacetyl derivatives. The metabolites determined were 2- and 3-dechloroethyliphosphamide, 4-ketoiphosphamide, carboxyiphosphamide, iphosphamide mustard, and two previously undetected metabolites, chloroethylamine and 1,3-oxazolidine-2-one. The isolation of the acidic and neutral metabolites was performed by solid phase extraction on to C₁₈ adsorbent at pH 4. The weakly acidic iphosphamide mustard, isolated under these conditions with a yield of ca 50%, was measured as a stable methyltrifluoroacetyl derivative, in contrast to the corresponding phosphoramide mustard of the isomer cyclophosphamide which decomposes during derivatization. Chloroethylamine and 1,3-oxazolidine-2-one were isolated with high yield by liquid extraction with ethyl acetate at pH 10. Selective measurement of several metabolite derivatives with similar retention times was performed by multiple ion monitoring MS of specific ion masses, using a methyl phenyl siloxane capillary column previously employed in the study of cyclophosphamide metabolites. Quantitation of metabolites in patient plasma samples could be performed in the concentration range 3 ng to 20 μg per ml of original plasma.     

Electron excitation cross section of atomic transitions in the two‐state approximation

The cross section of the 3s → 3p transition of sodium produced by electron impact has been calculated by performing a numerical integration of the coupled differential equations. The potential functions have been calculated exactly using the hydrogen‐like wave functions for the valence electron of the sodium with an effective charge adjusted to fit the experimental 3s → 3p line strength. The results compare very well with experimental data and with those obtained using more elaborate and sophisticated models.     

Bis(pentafluorophenyl) disulfide as a hydrogen abstractor and an electron acceptor from the resulting radical intermediate

The pentafluorobenzenethiyl radical is an efficient hydrogen abstractor from an activated methylene or methine group and bis(pentafluorophenyl) disulfide is an efficient electron acceptor from the resulting radical intermediate. Thus benzyl-OTBS ether was easily converted into the corresponding pinacol, and 2-phenyl-1,3-dioxanes are converted into the monobenzoates of diols.     

Quantized charge transport in adiabatic pumping by a driven double δ-barrier

We investigate the condition that the charge carried by quantum parametric pumping per cycle is quantized in units of the electron charge e and the role of adiabaticity in charge quantization. Using a driven double-δ-potential model and a Floquet scattering approach, it is found that the quantization phenomenon occurs only at very low frequencies of the oscillating potential and adiabaticity of the potential modulation is crucial for quantization.     

Interpretive approach to collective effects of electrons in multicenter problems

Interpretive theoretical tools prove valuable in guiding the analysis of experiments in the realm of atomic clusters. Here, we review basic elements of an analytic approach that makes it possible to find and visualize the effective electrostatic potential and Coulomb correlations in multicenter problems. To illustrate the utility of these concepts we apply them to exploring molecular-doped metallic clusters. This study is aiming at a systematic, visual assessment of changes induced in screening, Coulomb correlation and effective potential by varying the charge of the electronegative impurity and its position in the cluster cage.     

C D : a computer program to generate 1D, 2D and 3D grids of functions dependent on the molecular ab initio electron density

A program to compute many functions dependent on the electron density ρ(r) from the results of ab initio molecular calculations is presented. The program allows the generation of different one-, two-, and three-dimensional grids for further graphical representation or numerical analysis. Other options like extracting separate atom contributions to the function computed or locating maximum and minimum values are also implemented. A number of illustrative applications regarding different ρ(r)-dependent functions are presented and the performance and portability of the program is discussed.     

Preparation of well-aligned carbon nanotubes by pyrolysis of phenolic resin in anodic alumina pores

Well-aligned carbon nanotubes (CNTs) of high quality were synthesized by pyrolysis of phenolic resin at 800 °C in anodic alumina oxide (AAO) pores under argon protection. The innocuous source materials and safe operational conditions permit this method to synthesize well-aligned CNTs in large-scale and low cost. The formation mechanism of the synthesized CNTs is also proposed in this work by a series of visual sketches and is proved with obvious evidence. Firstly, phenolic resin nanotubes form in the template pores through the evaporation of solvent. Heat treatment then transfers these tubes into CNTs.     

Photochemical deprotection of nitro-substituted benzenesulfenates via photoinduced electron transfer

The photochemical deprotection of alkyl 2,4-dinitrobenzenesulfenate or alkyl 2-nitrobenzenesulfenate was successfully achieved by addition of triethylamine, while it was unsuccessful without triethylamine. The sulfur-oxygen bond cleavage is thought to occur heterolytically in the sulfenate anion radical produced by photoinduced electron transfer with triethylamine.