Gallium ion FIB-SEM sample preparation has a damage limit; low-energy argon ion beam cleaning is used to improve TEM sample quality
Gallium ion focused ion beam-scanning electron microscopy (Ga⁺ FIB-SEM) has become an important method for site-specific thin lamella sample preparation for transmission electron microscopy/scanning transmission electron microscopy (TEM/STEM), enabling cutting, extraction, and thinning of target regions at the nanometer scale. However, the literature indicates that while gallium ions provide high-precision machining capability, they also cause amorphization, ion implantation, and localized chemical modification on the sample surface, which can subsequently affect high-resolution imaging and energy dispersive spectroscopy analysis results. According to the literature, Ga⁺ FIB-SEM typically enables high-resolution site-specific machining at 30 keV, but high-energy gallium ions form a damage layer on the sample sidewalls. Taking silicon as an example...
2026-08-31
