Characterization of the low accelerating voltage performance of a microchannel plate based detector system for scanning microscopy
The Galileo SEM2000 microchannel plate (MCP) detector collects onaxis symmetrical secondary electron images at accelerating voltages as low as 200 eV and beam currents less than 5 picoamps. Symmetrical images are particularly useful in metrology and for viewing features that are shielded by topology from an off-axis detector. Backscatter images from the same on-axis orientation can be obtained at accelerating voltages below 500 eV and beam currents less than 10 picoamps.The ability to image secondary and backscattered electrons in the same orientation, together with extremely high detection efficiency for low energy electrons make it a valuable tool for direct analysis of beam-sensitive or dielectric samples. Additional topographic enhancement can be obtained by A-B signal processing at accelerating voltages as low as 200 eV.