Nano cluster dissociation sensitive to the elasticity of metal as a collision target

TL;DR

This study demonstrates that the dissociation behavior of cluster ions upon collision with metals depends on the metal's elastic properties, offering a new way to evaluate mechanical properties like Young's modulus.

Contribution

It reveals the dependence of cluster ion dissociation rates on the elastic response of target metals, linking dissociation behavior to impulsive stress during collision.

Findings

Dissociation rates vary significantly among different metals.

Impulsive stress correlates with dissociation rates.

Potential for new material property evaluation methods.

Abstract

The sensitive dependence of the cluster ion dissociation behavior on the elastic response of the target metal is experimentally demonstrated. Five types of metal are bombarded with cluster ions consisting of thousands of argon atoms at an incident kinetic energy per atom of less than 10 eV. A mass spectroscopic analysis of dissociated ions such as dimer or trimer is carried out. The dissociation rate is found to be significantly different for each metal. The relationship between the dissociation rate and the impulsive stress at the contact between the cluster ion and the metal is investigated. The impulsive stress is calculated based on the Youngs modulus of the cluster ion and the metal, under the assumption that the collision is initially elastic. As a result, magnitude correlation in the dissociation rate well corresponds with that in the impulsive stress. This result is important in that it suggests a new method to evaluate mechanical property of materials such as Youngs modulus by analyzing the collision with nanocluster ions.