STEM observation of tungsten tips sharpened by field-assisted oxygen etching

Tungsten tips oriented toward the <111> direction were fabricated by field-assisted O2 etching, and observed by means of scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) and field ion microscopy (FIM). The radii of curvature of the tip apexes were sharpened from 16–20 nm to less than 2 nm. The O2 etching is considered to start from the O2 imaging region depending on the field distribution around the tip apex and shank. We estimated the effect of field distribution derived from a shank shape and applied bias voltage. The results showed that the tip with a cylindrical shank before the O2 etching became sharper than tips having an initial paraboloidal shape, with respective cone angles (defined in Fig. 3) of 58° and 80°. The field emission (FE) patterns of these etched tips became a single spot derived from the W(111) plane, and their opening angles (defined by the full width at half maximum) were 14.4° and 7.8°, respectively.