Ion beam analysis

Full text: Ion beam analysis is an accelerator application area for the study of materials and the structure of matter; electrostatic accelerators of the Van de Graaff or Dynamitron type are often used for energies up to a few MeV. Two types of machines are available - the single-ended accelerator type with higher beam currents and greater flexibility of beam management, or the tandem accelerator, limited to atomic species with negative ions. The accelerators are not generally installed at specialist accelerator laboratories and have to be easy to maintain and simple to operate. The most common technique for industrial research is Rutherford Back Scattering Spectrometry (RBS). Helium ions are the preferred projectiles, since at elevated energies (above 3 MeV) nuclear resonance scattering can be used to detect photons associated with target molecules containing elements such as carbon, nitrogen or oxygen. Due to the large amount of available data on nuclear reactions in this energy range, activation analysis (detecting trace elements by irradiating the sample) can be performed with charged particles from accelerators over a wider range of atoms than with the conventional use of neutrons, which is more suited to light elements. Resonance reactions have been used to detect trace metals such as aluminium, titanium and vanadium. Hydrogen atoms are vital to the material performance of several classes of materials, such as semiconductors, insulators and ceramics. Prudent selection of the projectile ion aids the analysis of hydrogen composition; the technique is then a simple measurement of the emitted gamma radiation. Solar cell material and glass can be analysed in this way. On a world-wide basis, numerous laboratories perform ion beam analysis for research purposes; considerable work is carried out in cooperation between scientific laboratories and industry, but only a few laboratories provide a completely commercial service