Temperature and Flux dependence of ion induced ripple: a way to study defect and relaxation kinetics during ion bombardment

摘要

We have measured the temperature and ion flux dependence of the ripple wavelength on a Cu(001) surface during low energy ion sputtering. We analyze these results in terms of a linear instability model and identify different experimentally observed behavior with different mechanisms of relaxation and surface defect kinetics. In a high temperature regime, diffusing species on the surface are mainly thermally induced while in a lower temperature range, the diffusing species are ion beam induced. At even lower temperature, thermal diffusion is deactivated and the surface relaxes through an athermal mechanism. We define a transition between different defects formation kinetics in temperature and flux phase space and discuss how the defect kinetics model can be extended to different materials system.