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Description:

Atom probe tomography (APT) has become a popular technique for microstructural analysis of a wide range of alloys and devices over the past two decades owing to the employment of laser-assisted field evaporation and the development of site-specific tip preparation using a focused ion beam (FIB) with a scanning electron microscopy (SEM) system. In laser-assisted field evaporation, laser irradiation conditions largely influence mass resolution; therefore, recent commercial APT instruments allow strict control of the analysis conditions. However, the mass resolution is affected not only by the laser condition but also by the thermal conductivity of the material and the tip shape. In addition, it is also important to keep the tip shape constant in order to obtain tomography data with good reproducibility since the analytical volume highly depends on the tip shape. In this study, we have developed a method to fabricate the tip with the desired shape automatically by using a script-controlled FIB-SEM system, which has traditionally depended on the skill of the FIB-SEM operator. The tip shape was then intentionally changed by using this method, and its effect on the APT data is also discussed.

Rights:

• Creative Commons BY-NC-ND Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International
  

Keyword: atom probe tomography, focused ion beam, scanning electron microscopy, automation

Date published: 2023-02-19

Publisher: Elsevier BV

Journal:

• ULTRAMICROSCOPY (ISSN: 03043991) vol. 247 p. 113704-113704

Funding:

Manuscript type: Author's version (Accepted manuscript)

MDR DOI: https://doi.org/10.48505/nims.4208

First published URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ultramic.2023.113704

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Updated at: 2025-02-23 22:51:16 +0900

Published on MDR: 2025-02-23 22:51:16 +0900