Production of pulsed, mass-selected beams of metal and semiconductor clusters

We report on the development of a beam line for mass-selected metal and semiconductor clusters. The cluster source combines the principles of plasma sputtering and gas condensation. Both techniques together allow to produce clusters in a wide size range. With the aid of a time-of-flight system, small clusters (i.e., Cu-n(+), n < 100) are selected and pure beams containing only one cluster size are provided. For large clusters (containing several thousands of atoms), a beam with a narrow size distribution is obtained. A 90 degrees quadrupole deviator is used to separate charged clusters from neutral ones. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.