Abstract

In this article we describe the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) techniques of electron channelling contrast imaging and electron backscatter diffraction. These techniques provide information on crystal structure, crystal misorientation, grain boundaries, strain and structural defects on length scales from tens of nanometres to tens of micrometres. Here we report on the imaging and analysis of dislocations and sub-grains in nitride semiconductor thin films (GaN and AlN) and tungsten carbide-cobalt (WC-Co) hard metals. Our aim is to illustrate the capability of these techniques for investigating structural defects in the SEM and the benefits of combining these diffraction-based imaging techniques.

Highlights

  • scanning electron microscope (SEM) are extensively used for imaging topography by monitoring the intensity of secondary electrons as a focussed electron beam, with an energy in the range of 100 eV to 30 keV, is rastered over the surface of a sample

  • We provide an overview of these techniques and illustrate their application by describing some of our recent investigations of the structural properties of nitride semiconductor thin films (GaN and AlN) and WC-Co hard metals

  • The electron channelling contrast imaging (ECCI) micrographs shown in this paper were acquired at 20 - 30 keV and we show ECCI micrographs where dislocations of order 80 nm apart can be resolved

Read more

Summary

IOP Publishing

Series: Materials Science and Engineering 891 (2020) 012023 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/891/1/012023. C Trager-Cowan, A Alasmari, W Avis, J Bruckbauer, P R Edwards, B Hourahine, S Kraeusel, G Kusch, B M Jablon, R Johnston, R W Martin, R McDermott, G Naresh-Kumar, M Nouf-Allehiani, E Pascal, D Thomson, S Vespucci, K Mingard, P J Parbrook, M D Smith, J Enslin, F Mehnke, M Kneissl, C Kuhn, T Wernicke, A Knauer, S Hagedorn, S Walde, M Weyers, P-M Coulon, P A Shields, Y Zhang, L Jiu, Y Gong, R M Smith, T Wang and A Winkelmann

Introduction
Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd
BSE detector under pole pieces inclined sample
Diffraction cones
Lower hemisphere
Full Text
Published version (Free)

Talk to us

Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have

Schedule a call