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Far‐reaching geometrical artefacts due to thermal decomposition of polymeric coatings around focused ion beam milled pigment particles
Author(s) -
RYKACZEWSKI K.,
MIERITZ D.G.,
LIU M.,
MA Y.,
IEZZI E.B.,
SUN X.,
WANG L.P.,
SOLANKI K.N.,
SEO D.K.,
WANG R.Y.
Publication year - 2016
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 - 10.1111/jmi.12367
Subject(s) - focused ion beam , materials science , ion beam , scanning electron microscope , coating , composite number , ion , composite material , nanotechnology , beam (structure) , chemical engineering , optics , chemistry , organic chemistry , engineering , physics
Summary Focused ion beam and scanning electron microscope (FIB‐SEM) instruments are extensively used to characterize nanoscale composition of composite materials, however, their application to analysis of organic corrosion barrier coatings has been limited. The primary concern that arises with use of FIB to mill organic materials is the possibility of severe thermal damage that occurs in close proximity to the ion beam impact. Recent research has shown that such localized artefacts can be mitigated for a number of polymers through cryogenic cooling of the sample as well as low current milling and intelligent ion beam control. Here we report unexpected nonlocalized artefacts that occur during FIB milling of composite organic coatings with pigment particles. Specifically, we show that FIB milling of pigmented polysiloxane coating can lead to formation of multiple microscopic voids within the substrate as far as 5 μm away from the ion beam impact. We use further experimentation and modelling to show that void formation occurs via ion beam heating of the pigment particles that leads to decomposition and vaporization of the surrounding polysiloxane. We also identify FIB milling conditions that mitigate this issue.