Abstract

With the advent of the super-tip ion source very favourable conditions for generating ion nano-beams have been provided. The basic physical principles for a super-tip-gas field ion source are described As a consequence of a very small source emittance of ? ~ 10^-24 m²sr ultra-bright rare gas ion beams of about 10¹⁶ A/m².sr can be produced. As a further consequence, very narrow probe sizes are obtainable, of d_p< 1 nm, with spatial resolutions far below the classical limits of light-optics and even below the novel stimulated-emission-depletion microscopy [*STED (microscopy) = stimulated emission depletion (microscopy) Th. A. Klar, S. W. Hell, Opt.Lett. 24 (1999) 954-956]. Various ion-nanobeam applications in both materials modification, and analysis are envisaged.

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