Microscopic characterization of materials by ion beam and hyperfine interaction analysis

Abstract

The microscopic characterization of defects and impurities in materials plays a fundamental role both in the field of advanced materials synthesis and processing and in the field of materials properties. With the application of only one method of analysis there is seldom the possibility to get model independent information in a wide range of systems. Ion beam analysis techniques like Rutherford backscattering spectroscopy (RBS), nuclear reaction analysis (NRA), particle induced X-ray emission (PIXE) and elastic recoil detection (ERD) of hydrogen are frequently applied in materials characterization studies but seldom are they combined with hyperfine interaction studies. In the present work, the analytical potential of the combination of RBS/channeling and perturbed angular correlation (PAC) is illustrated using typical results obtained with metallic, semiconductor and insulator systems formed either by crystal growth or by ion implantation and annealing. We consider first Hf-O dumbbells in Be, and In-As pairs in Si. Then we present a detailed analysis of the optoelectronic material LiNbO 3 doped during growth or post implanted with hafnium. This impurity can be introduced 100% in different regular lattice sites of the LiNbO 3 crystal lattice by changing the crystal growth conditions or by annealing the hafnium implanted crystal.