Polyatomic Ions from Liquid Metal Alloy Ion Sources for Broad Beam Ion Irradiation

Surface patterning based on self-organized nano-structures on i.e. semiconductor materials formed by heavy mono - and polyatomic ion irradiation from Liquid Metal (Alloy) Ion Sources (LMAIS) is a very promising technique [1,2]. To overcome the lack of only very small treated areas by applying a Focused Ion Beam (FIB) instrument this technology was transferred into larger single-end ion beam systems like an ion implanter. Main component is an ion beam injector based on high current LMAIS, developed for space propulsion systems [3] combined with suited ion optics allocating ion currents in the µA range in a nearly parallel beam of a few mm in diameter. The mass selection of the needed ion species can be performed either by an introduced ExB mass separator (Wien filter) and/or the existing magnet of the ion implanter itself which also can define the final ion energy up to 200 keV.
Different types of LMAIS [4] (needle, porous emitter, capillary) are presented and characterized. The ion beam injector design is specified as well as the implementation of this module into a high current ion implanter (Danfysik Series 1090) operating at the HZDR Ion Beam Center (IBC). The obtained results of a large area surface modification (mm²) of Ge at room temperature using Bi2+ polyatomic ions from a GaBi capillary LMAIS is presented and compared with the small area dot structures (µm²) made by mass separated FIB.

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