Degradation of polyimide and polyethyleneterephtalate irradiated with 150 and 200 keV Ar+ ions, studied by RBS and ERD techniques

Polyimide (Upilex, PI) and polyethyleneterephtalate (Mylar, PET) were irradiated with 200 and 150 keV Ar+ ions respectively to different fluences and the depth profiles of hydrogen and oxygen atoms in polymer surface layer were determined using standard Rutherford backscattering (RBS) and elastic recoil detection (ERD) techniques. Significant hydrogen and oxygen depletion is observed at the ion fluences above 1 x 10(14) cm(-2). Above 5 x 10(15) cm(-2) a saturated state is achieved when another fluence increase does not result in significant changes of the H and O profile shape. At higher fluences the H and O depth profiles are rather flat with no local minima. This finding indicates only minor role of nuclear stopping in production of volatile degradation products. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.