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Radiation damage of water in environmental scanning electron microscopy
Author(s) -
Royall C. P.,
Thiel B. L.,
Donald A. M.
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
journal of microscopy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.569
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1365-2818
pISSN - 0022-2720
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-2818.2001.00948.x
Subject(s) - radiation damage , scanning electron microscope , environmental scanning electron microscope , materials science , microscopy , electron microscope , scanning confocal electron microscopy , nanotechnology , optics , radiation , physics
Specimen damage from the electron beam poses a considerable problem with electron microscopy. This damage is particularly acute in environmental scanning electron microscopy (ESEM) for two reasons. Firstly, owing to its ability to stabilise insulating and hydrated specimens, ESEM lends itself to polymeric and biological materials that are typically highly beam‐sensitive. Secondly, water acts as a source of small, highly mobile free radicals, which accelerate specimen degradation. By taking the results of single‐particle simulations of electron–water interactions, we determine the concentration of reactive species in a water specimen under ESEM conditions. We consider 12 species, which are produced in a Gaussian distribution, and annihilate according to a second‐order reaction scheme. Self‐diffusion along the concentration gradient is also modelled. We find that the dominant reactive species is the hydroxyl (.OH) radical. Annihilation of this species is suppressed due to the lower concentration of reactants. The relatively stable hydrogen peroxide is also found at large concentrations. By comparing two beam energies, 5 and 25 keV, we find a drastic increase in the quantities of reactive species produced with beam energy. The longer range of 25 keV primary electrons spreads reactive species over a wider region, which then decay far more slowly.