Surface Investigations of Selected Materials by Low-Energy Ion Scattering Technique |
| D. Goc-Jagło, D. Sitko, G. Jagło, N.-T.H. Kim-Ngan and W. Soszka
Institute of Physics, Pedagogical University, Podchorążych 2, 30-084 Kraków, Poland |
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| Surfaces of three selected materials were investigated by means of low-energy ion-scattering technique: (1) the magnetite (Fe3O4) exhibiting the so-called Verwey transition (TV(bulk)=125 K) accompanied by a small cubic-monoclinic crystal distortion, (2) the intermetallic compound NdMn2 undergoing an antiferromagnetic-paramagnetic phase transition (TN=104 K) accompanied by a large crystal distortion with a volume change of 1%, and (3) the typical insulator BaTiO3 with two structural transitions below 300 K. The primary energy of the (Ne+, Ar+) ion beam was in the range of 4-8 keV, and the low-energy ion-scattering spectra were collected in the temperature range of 85-300 K. A large influence from the Verwey transition on the neutralization and re-ionization of scattered ions from magnetite surface was observed, while no visible change at the magnetic phase transition in NdMn2 was revealed in the low-energy ion-scattering spectra. A strong dependence of the characteristics of the low-energy ion-scattering spectra on the irradiated time was observed for BaTiO3 indicating that this surface was heavily charged by ion bombardments. |
| DOI: 10.12693/APhysPolA.111.763 PACS numbers: 68.35.Rh, 71.20.Be, 71.20.Eh, 77.80.Bh |