Chemical Homogeneity and Charge Transfer in Amorphous Si-N Alloys

It is well known that for reflections corresponding to large interplanar spacings (i.e., sin θ/λ small), the electron scattering amplitude, f, is sensitive to the ionicity and to the charge distribution around the atoms. We have used this in order to obtain information about the charge distribution in FeTi, which is a candidate for storage of hydrogen. Our goal is to study the changes in electron distribution in the presence of hydrogen, and also the ionicity of hydrogen in metals, but so far our study has been limited to pure FeTi. FeTi has the CsCl structure and thus Fe and Ti scatter with a phase difference of π into the 100-ref lections. Because Fe (Z = 26) is higher in the periodic system than Ti (Z = 22), an immediate “guess” would be that Fe has a larger scattering amplitude than Ti. However, relativistic Hartree-Fock calculations show that the opposite is the case for the 100-reflection. An explanation for this may be sought in the stronger localization of the d-electrons of the first row transition elements when moving to the right in the periodic table. The tabulated difference between fTi (100) and ffe (100) is small, however, and based on the values of the scattering amplitude for isolated atoms, the kinematical intensity of the 100-reflection is only 5.10-4 of the intensity of the 200-reflection.

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Growth of near noble metal Pd and Pt thin film silicides morphology and structure

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s0424820100112464 ◽

1984 ◽

Vol 42 ◽

pp. 498-499

Author(s):

E. I. Alessandrini ◽

M. O. Aboelfotoh

Keyword(s):

Noble Metals ◽

Annealing Temperature ◽

Chemical Compounds ◽

Barrier Properties ◽

Solid State Reactions ◽

Transmission Electron ◽

Stable Chemical ◽

Metal Thickness ◽

Amorphous Si ◽

Si Films

Considerable interest has been generated in solid state reactions between thin films of near noble metals and silicon. These metals deposited on Si form numerous stable chemical compounds at low temperatures and have found applications as Schottky barrier contacts to silicon in VLSI devices. Since the very first phase that nucleates in contact with Si determines the barrier properties, the purpose of our study was to investigate the silicide formation of the near noble metals, Pd and Pt, at very thin thickness of the metal films on amorphous silicon.Films of Pd and Pt in the thickness range of 0.5nm to 20nm were made by room temperature evaporation on 40nm thick amorphous Si films, which were first deposited on 30nm thick amorphous Si3N4 membranes in a window configuration. The deposition rate was 0.1 to 0.5nm/sec and the pressure during deposition was 3 x 10 -7 Torr. The samples were annealed at temperatures in the range from 200° to 650°C in a furnace with helium purified by hot (950°C) Ti particles. Transmission electron microscopy and diffraction techniques were used to evaluate changes in structure and morphology of the phases formed as a function of metal thickness and annealing temperature.

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High-angle electron scattering from amorphous silicon

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s0424820100137185 ◽

1995 ◽

Vol 53 ◽

pp. 162-163

Author(s):

M. Libera ◽

J.A. Ott ◽

K. Siangchaew ◽

L. Tsung

Keyword(s):

Electron Scattering ◽

Amorphous Material ◽

Structural Defects ◽

Constant Thickness ◽

High Angle ◽

Fast Electrons ◽

Angle Scattering ◽

Stem Image ◽

Amorphous Si ◽

Thermal Vibrations

Channeling occurs when fast electrons follow atomic strings in a crystal where there is a minimum in the potential energy (1). Channeling has a strong effect on high-angle scattering. Deviations in atomic position along a channel due to structural defects or thermal vibrations increase the probability of scattering (2-5). Since there are no extended channels in an amorphous material the question arises: for a given material with constant thickness, will the high-angle scattering be higher from a crystal or a glass?Figure la shows a HAADF STEM image collected using a Philips CM20 FEG TEM/STEM with inner and outer collection angles of 35mrad and lOOmrad. The specimen (6) was a cross section of singlecrystal Si containing: amorphous Si (region A), defective Si containing many stacking faults (B), two coherent Ge layers (CI; C2), and a contamination layer (D). CBED patterns (fig. lb), PEELS spectra, and HAADF signals (fig. lc) were collected at 106K and 300K along the indicated line.

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Direct imaging of charge transfer

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s0424820100165860 ◽

1996 ◽

Vol 54 ◽

pp. 680-681

Author(s):

Yimei Zhu ◽

J. Tafto

Keyword(s):

Charge Transfer ◽

Electron Diffraction ◽

Scattering Amplitude ◽

High Temperature Superconductors ◽

Charge Carriers ◽

Image Charge ◽

Net Charge ◽

Long Time ◽

Electron Holes ◽

First Time

The electron holes confined to the CuO2-plane are the charge carriers in high-temperature superconductors, and thus, the distribution of charge plays a key role in determining their superconducting properties. While it has been known for a long time that in principle, electron diffraction at low angles is very sensitive to charge transfer, we, for the first time, show that under a proper TEM imaging condition, it is possible to directly image charge in crystals with a large unit cell. We apply this new way of studying charge distribution to the technologically important Bi2Sr2Ca1Cu2O8+δ superconductors.Charged particles interact with the electrostatic potential, and thus, for small scattering angles, the incident particle sees a nuclei that is screened by the electron cloud. Hence, the scattering amplitude mainly is determined by the net charge of the ion. Comparing with the high Z neutral Bi atom, we note that the scattering amplitude of the hole or an electron is larger at small scattering angles. This is in stark contrast to the displacements which contribute negligibly to the electron diffraction pattern at small angles because of the short g-vectors.

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