An ultra high vacuum transmission electron microscope (UHV-TEM) has been successfully developed for in situ observation of the islands and silicides formation on silicon surface at high temperatures by reflection electron microscope (REM) and TEM. The cleaning process of the contaminated Si(100) surface by heating to 1150°C was successfully observed by REM. The thinning process of the Si(100) specimen by heating to 900°C with the oxygen exposure is dynamically observed by TEM. The observation of the surface steps on Si(100) with TEM is also carried out with considerable success. The present results lead us to the confirmation that the developed UHV-TEM can be applied to the study of the islands and silicides formation by in situ REM and TEM observation.

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The non-destructive and highly quantitative high-resolution Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (HRBS) was applied to the analysis of layered structure at the surface and near-surface of deposited thin film materials. The depth resolution of HRBS was determined as 0.2nm from measurement of Ta/Co/Ta multilayer films. HRBS provided compositional and structural information, and Ar distribution for the near surface region of aluminum films deposited on Si-substrate by electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) sputtering and chemical vapor deposition (CVD). Ta-oxide/Ta multilayer specimens with were also analyzed for different milling processing. Individual Ta oxide layers were clearly resolved and the thickness of each layer was obtained. These results lead to a simple, easy and efficient calculation procedure of oxide layer thickness required for a process monitoring.

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We applied Grazing Exit Electron Probe Microanalysis (GE-EPMA) to analyze an inclusion on an uneven surface of a metallic material and investigated its efficiency. It is necessary in GE-EPMA that an analytical object exists on a flat surface due to its principle. A range of its application has ever been narrow due to this restriction and applications have ever been few. We have developed a novel method of an adjustment of an exit angle of characteristic X-rays to do an analysis of GE-EPMA by using a usual EDS-SEM. Then we tried to apply it to qualitative analyses of small (approximately 0.3 μm) inclusions on a uneven surface of an etched stainless steel. As the result of the analysis, it was possible to identify the component of the inclusion. The inclusion was an oxide that consisted of Mg, Al, Ca, Ti, Cr and Mn.

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