UHV-TEM imaging and diffraction study of Cu-Au on Si(111)
It has been demonstrated that ultra-high vacuum transmission electron microscopy is a powerful technique in solving surface atomic structures. During some recent work while we were testing surface imaging modes using the Si(111)-7×7 surface, we accidentally contaminated the surface by sputtering copper and some gold from the specimen holder onto the silicon. This paper presents the results of transmission electron diffraction and imaging studies of this surface.Experiments were performed in a Hitachi UHV H-9000 300 keV electron microscope with a stable operation pressure of 1x10-10 Torr. Attached to the microscope is a UHV surface science chamber for in situ sample preparation. A thin sample of silicon (111) (P doped to 80 ohm-cm) was mechanically polished, dimpled, and ion-beam thinned before being transferred into the surface science chamber. The sample was then ion beam sputter cleaned using 3-4 Kv argon ions and annealed to about 600°C using an electron gun (4-5 Kv, 2-3 Ma). Later tests indicated that the ion gun was not centered around the 3 mm disk and a part of the sample surface was covered by the sputtered materials from the sample holder. EDX results from a Hitachi HF-2000 analytical microscope showed that the deposited layer consisted of about 70% Cu and 30% Au.