Nano-Structures made by Swift Heavy Ions

Recently we have discovered that the irradiation of thin oxide films with swift heavy ions (SHI) at small incident angles results in an instability of the film against periodic cracking and subsequent reorganisation on a sub-micron level due to ion hammering. Varying the conditions during irradiation (ion species, rotating the target) we were able to generate a wide range of nano-structures and patterns, the most interesting of which was an array of NiO-nanopillars with a diameter of the order of 100 nm and a height of about 2000 nm. Unfortunately, the arrangement of these nanotowers was not regular. [1] To overcome this problem, we have prestructured the films by means of a focused ion beam with an array of perpendicular cuts of about 100 nm width and 1000 nm distance. In fact, the subsequent irradiation with SHI under grazing incidence and permanent target rotation results in an ordered array of the NiO nanotowers. To our surprise, the same treatment of TiO-films lead to an ordered pattern of holes.
[1] W. Bolse, T. Bolse, C. Dais, D. Etissa-Debissa, A. Elsanousi, A. Feyh, M. Kalafat, H. Paulus, Surf. Coat. Technol. 200 (2005) 1430