Nauka i Obrazovanie (Jan 2015)

Research of the Ion Current Density Influence on the Glass-Ceramics Surface Defects Forming under Ion-Beam Processing

  • V. G. Pozdnyakov,
  • V. A. Ryazanov,
  • A. V. Zhukov

DOI
https://doi.org/10.7463/0615.0786539
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 0, no. 6
pp. 397 – 408

Abstract

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Development of modern optics is primarily determined by manufacturing accuracy of the working surfaces of optical parts. Therefore, at the last stage of manufacturing optical parts the ion-beam treatment is applied. This method uses spraying the high-energy ions of heavy gases on the surface of a solid body. After an intense ion treatment there are microscopic defects, resembling chips, on the surface of polycrystalline glass. The aim of this work is to study distribution of the surface density of defects by sizes, depending on the density of ion current.Accelerator with an anode layer and a focused ion beam was used as an ion source. The accelerator worked on argon and created ion beam with Gaussian distribution of current density along the radius. The excess positive charge of the ion beam was compensated owing to ionization of residual gas. To eliminate the influence of slow ions with peripheral regions of the ion beam, the etching was performed through a circular aperture with a diameter of 40 mm.Surface treatment of the sample was carried out at the discharge voltage of 3800 V and current of 50 mA for 30 min. The maximum ion current density on the sample surface was 20.2 A/m2 and a power density was of 5.4·104 W/m2 .Distribution of defects by size was measured in three areas of the treated surface corresponding to different densities of ion current, namely: 20.2 A/m2 , 11.3A/m2 , and 3.4 A/m2 . Their number per area unit defines a density of defects.The results show that with increasing ion current density the density of defects on the surface of polycrystalline glass decreases. Thus a view of distribution function of defect density according to size is changed: density of small defects is reduced, and density of large ones increases. Also with increasing ion current density is observed an increase in the size of defects: a 6 times increase of the average size of defects results in 1.6 times increasing ion current density.These data will be useful to predict the degree of polycrystalline glass surface destruction during ion-beam treatment, as well as to determine the minimum allowable power densities of the ion beam.

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