Angular-Dependent Sputtering of Copper Single Crystals

Abstract

The dependence of the sputtering yield upon the angle of incidence for copper single crystals by bombardment with 20‐keV Ne⁺, Ar⁺, and Kr⁺ ions has been measured. The maxima and minima in this dependence, which have been found, can be correlated to a transparency in different directions of the first few lattice planes. An effective collision diameter deduced from the angular dependence of sputtering by Ar⁺ ion bombardment on a copper (100) single‐crystal surface was found to be 0.39 Å. This value is 3 times larger than the effective collision diameter calculated from the hard sphere approximation for a Bohr potential, taking into account the thermal motion of the lattice particles.