Fabrication of Specimens for Atom Probe Tomography Using a Combined Gallium and Neon Focused Ion Beam Milling Approach

Frances I Allen; Paul T Blanchard; Russell Lake; David Pappas; Deying Xia; John A Notte; Ruopeng Zhang; Andrew M Minor; Norman A Sanford

doi:10.1093/micmic/ozad078

Fabrication of Specimens for Atom Probe Tomography Using a Combined Gallium and Neon Focused Ion Beam Milling Approach

Microsc Microanal. 2023 Sep 29;29(5):1628-1638. doi: 10.1093/micmic/ozad078.

Authors

Frances I Allen^{1

2}, Paul T Blanchard³, Russell Lake³, David Pappas³, Deying Xia⁴, John A Notte⁴, Ruopeng Zhang^{1

2}, Andrew M Minor^{1

2}, Norman A Sanford³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
² National Center for Electron Microscopy, Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
³ Physical Measurement Laboratory, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Boulder, CO 80305, USA.
⁴ Carl Zeiss SMT Inc., Danvers, MA 01923, USA.

PMID: 37584510
DOI: 10.1093/micmic/ozad078

Abstract

We demonstrate a new focused ion beam sample preparation method for atom probe tomography. The key aspect of the new method is that we use a neon ion beam for the final tip-shaping after conventional annulus milling using gallium ions. This dual-ion approach combines the benefits of the faster milling capability of the higher current gallium ion beam with the chemically inert and higher precision milling capability of the noble gas neon ion beam. Using a titanium-aluminum alloy and a layered aluminum/aluminum-oxide tunnel junction sample as test cases, we show that atom probe tips prepared using the combined gallium and neon ion approach are free from the gallium contamination that typically frustrates composition analysis of these materials due to implantation, diffusion, and embrittlement effects. We propose that by using a focused ion beam from a noble gas species, such as the neon ions demonstrated here, atom probe tomography can be more reliably performed on a larger range of materials than is currently possible using conventional techniques.

Keywords: atom probe tomography; focused ion beam; gas field ionization source; neon ions.