2018 年 61 巻 7 号 p. 458-462
Thanks to the development of a variety of huge cluster ion sources, time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (TOF-SIMS) has been applied to more fields. By means of gas cluster ion beams (GCIB) such as Ar cluster ions, 3D analysis of soft materials including biological cells and tissues is feasible. Moreover, the sputtering by GCIB is useful for removing damage caused by a conventional primary ion beam such as a Bi cluster ion beam. In addition, recently instrumental issues regarding mass spectrometers (MS) have been improved by introducing tandem MS and orbital ion trap MS to TOF-SIMS, which made TOF-SIMS more powerful for bio sample analysis. On the other hand, data analysis techniques are getting more important to interpret such TOF-SIMS data.
