Method and apparatus for transmission electron microscopy
AssigneeImec Vzw
InventorsUmberto Celano, Kristof Paredis, Wilfried Vandervorst
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The disclosure is related to a method and apparatus for transmission electron microscopy wherein a TEM specimen is subjected to at least one thinning step by scratching at least an area of the specimen with an SPM probe, and wherein the thinned area is subjected to an SPM acquisition step, using the same SPM probe or another probe.
Claims16
A method for performing transmission electron microscopy (TEM) on a TEM specimen, the method comprising:
- thinning at least an area of the TEM specimen by scratching a surface of the TEM specimen with a probe;
- performing, using the probe, a scanning probe microscopy (SPM) acquisition on the thinned area;
- exposing the thinned area to an electron beam;
- and
- taking a TEM image of the thinned area.
An apparatus comprising a probe, the apparatus being configured to perform functions comprising:
- thinning at least an area of a transmission electron microscopy (TEM) specimen by scratching a surface of the TEM specimen with the probe;
- performing, using the probe, an SPM acquisition on the thinned area;
- exposing the thinned area to an electron beam;
- and
- taking a TEM image of the thinned area.
A non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processor of an apparatus, cause the apparatus to perform functions comprising:
- thinning at least an area of a transmission electron microscopy (TEM) specimen by scratching a surface of the TEM specimen with a probe;
- performing, using the probe, a scanning probe microscopy (SPM) acquisition on the thinned area;
- exposing the thinned area to an electron beam;
- and
- taking a TEM image of the thinned area.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.