Journal
VACUUM
Volume 84, Issue 8, Pages 1062-1065Publisher
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.vacuum.2009.10.018
Keywords
Mica; AFM; Nanostructuring; Hillocks; Friction; Feature erasure
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Muscovite mica was irradiated with slow highly charged Arq+ (charge state q = 12,16) and Xeq+ (q = 23,27) ions in a kinetic energy range of 150-216 key and subsequently observed by contact mode atomic force microscopy. Surprisingly, on samples irradiated with Xe ions nano-sized hillock-like structures were found well below the charge state threshold reported in earlier experimental investigations. However, the structures found are not the result of a true topographic surface modification induced by the ion bombardment, because the absence of these nanostructures in tapping mode images and the dependence of the detected structures on scan conditions points towards a surface modification which manifests itself only in frictional forces and therefore in height measurement artifacts. Furthermore the generated defects are not stable but can be erased by continuous scanning. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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