METHOD FOR RECONSTRUCTING TWO-DIMENSIONAL CHEMICAL MAPS FROM ELECTRON SPECTROSCOPY LINE SCANS
First Claim
1. A method comprising:
- fast two-dimensional scanning a layered nanostructure with a scanning electron microscope to form a structure image having multiple layers;
slow-rate scanning the nanostructure along selected lines, collecting characteristic spectra;
extracting chemical profiles of the nanostructure from the spectra;
transforming the structure image into a warped structure image by flattening each of the layers in the structure image;
aligning the coordinates of the chemical profiles to those of the warped structure image;
averaging the chemical profiles obtained from different line scans;
expanding the averaged profiles into warped chemical maps; and
inversely transforming the warped chemical maps respectively into two-dimensional chemical maps.
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Abstract
Two-dimensional chemical maps of a layered nanostructure are reconstructed from selected spectroscopy line scans in a scanning electron microscope. Embodiments include fast two-dimensional scanning a layered nanostructure to form a structure image having multiple layers, slow-rate spectroscopy scanning the nanostructure along selected scanning lines to form chemical profiles, warping the structure image into a warped structure image by flattening each of the layers in the structure image, aligning chemical profiles to the warped structure image, forming warped chemical maps, and inversely transforming the warped chemical maps into two-dimensional chemical maps.
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Citations
20 Claims
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1. A method comprising:
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fast two-dimensional scanning a layered nanostructure with a scanning electron microscope to form a structure image having multiple layers; slow-rate scanning the nanostructure along selected lines, collecting characteristic spectra; extracting chemical profiles of the nanostructure from the spectra; transforming the structure image into a warped structure image by flattening each of the layers in the structure image; aligning the coordinates of the chemical profiles to those of the warped structure image; averaging the chemical profiles obtained from different line scans; expanding the averaged profiles into warped chemical maps; and inversely transforming the warped chemical maps respectively into two-dimensional chemical maps. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. A method comprising:
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fast two-dimensional scanning a layered nanostructure with an electron probe, with registering an ADF or BF detector signal to provide an image of the nanostructure, the image having multiple layers; generating a warped image by aligning the layers in the image using a warping matrix; collecting spectra of the nanostructure along selected scan lines; extracting chemical profiles from the collected spectra; aligning and averaging the chemical profiles; generating warped chemical maps from the averaged chemical profiles, the warped chemical maps having no chemical change along one axis within the plane of each layer; and applying an inverse of the warping matrix to the warped chemical maps to form two-dimensional chemical maps of the nanostructure. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
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19. A method comprising:
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fast two-dimensional scanning a layered semiconductor nanostructure with an electron probe to form an image having multiple layers; slow-rate scanning the nanostructure along a predetermined number of scan lines to form chemical profiles, each chemical profile corresponding to one of the scan lines and including multiple chemical elements; transforming the image into a warped image by; defining a morphology of the layers in the image with a criteria of equal signal levels; and forming a warped image using a warping matrix that continuously transforms the image while preserving a topology of the image, wherein the warped image shows no structural change along each of the layers; averaging chemical profiles from different line scans; expanding an averaged chemical profile into the warped chemical maps; aligning coordinates of the chemical profiles with those of the warped image; averaging chemical profiles from different line scans for each chemical element; expanding an averaged chemical profile into warped chemical maps, wherein each of the warped chemical maps exhibits no chemical change along an axis within the plane of each layer; and inversely transforming the warped chemical maps into two-dimensional chemical maps using a reverse warping matrix corresponding to the warping matrix. - View Dependent Claims (20)
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Specification