QUANTITATIVE AND REPRODUCIBLE ANALYSIS WITH THE CAMECA SXFIVE FE AT HIGH LATERAL RESOLUTION

摘要

The development of the Schottky emitter and its implementation as electron source in electron probe microanalysis has significantly improved the characterisation of materials in earth sciences and in metallurgy. The strength of electron probe microanalysis (EPMA) is the ability to accurately measure and quantify element in traces at a few 10's ppm level. The field emission (FE) source allows trace element analysis with high beam currents thanks to the high brightness of the source and the excellent stability of the beam current, trading off spatial resolution. Of course, accuracy of major element quantification is maintained with a FE source. To illustrate the stability of the FE source, the reproducibility of quantitative analysis over several weeks on a 316L stainless steel has been investigated. The results show la reproducibility better than ± 0.5 % for Fe and ± 0.01 % for Si also as minor elements.