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Scanning Electron Microscopy for Quantitative Small and Large Deformation Measurements Part I: SEM Imaging at Magnifications from 200 to 10,000

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Abstract

A series of baseline displacement measurements have been obtained using 2D Digital Image Correlation (2D-DIC) and images from Scanning Electron Microscopes (SEM). Direct correlation of subsets from a reference image to subsets in a series of uncorrected images is used to identify the presence of non-stationary step-changes in the measured displacements. Using image time integration and recently developed approaches to correct residual drift and spatial distortions in recorded images, results clearly indicate that the corrected SEM images can be used to extract deformations with displacement accuracy of ±0.02 pixels (1 nm at magnification of 10,000) and mean value strain measurements that are consistent with independent estimates and have point-to-point strain variability of ±1.5 × 10−4.

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Notes

  1. In this work, the SEM backscatter detectors typically recorded an image with 8 bits (0–255), though it is possible to record SEM images with additional bits.

  2. Typically each island must occupy at least 2 × 2 pixel areas for accurate, subset-based image registration. Since the gold island size ≈300 nm for this specimen, magnifications of 3,000 and 10,000 correspond to ≈2 × 2 to 6 × 6 sampling of the specimen pattern. In this case, subset sizes of 15 × 15 and 41 × 41 would be reasonable for matching at magnifications of 3,000 and 10,000, respectively.

  3. Another SEM, using a cold field emission gun (FEG), within Oak Ridge National Laboratory was used in September, 2005. When the images were compared using 2D-DIC, position step changes were measured throughout the imaging process.

  4. Several suggestions were provided by Dr. John Caola and Dr. Richard S. Van Luvender Jr. from FEI.

  5. If one assumes that the same dimensional step change would occur at any magnification, then a 10 nm step change would correspond to an error of 0.008 pixels at a magnification of 200X. Consistent with the results shown in Fig. 6, this deviation would not be readily visible in the computed distortion fields at 200X since it is below the noise level for these cases.

  6. The topographic signal, which is the difference in the signals from A and B, A–B, is to be affected by surface topography on the specimen. Though not used in these studies, it may be worthwhile to perform an experiment using the A–B signal to define each image.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, 29208, USA

    M. A. Sutton (SEM member), N. Li (SEM member), A. P. Reynolds & X. Li (SEM member)

  2. Professor and Director of Nanolithography Facility, University of Tenessee, Knoxville, TN, 37996-0840, USA

    D. C. Joy

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  1. M. A. Sutton
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  2. N. Li
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  3. D. C. Joy
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  4. A. P. Reynolds
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  5. X. Li
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Correspondence to M. A. Sutton.

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Sutton, M.A., Li, N., Joy, D.C. et al. Scanning Electron Microscopy for Quantitative Small and Large Deformation Measurements Part I: SEM Imaging at Magnifications from 200 to 10,000. Exp Mech 47, 775–787 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11340-007-9042-z

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