Institute of Metals Division - Scanning Electron Microscopy as Applied to the Oxidation of Iron

A scanning electron microscope with a resolving power better then 100Å has been developed for the direct examination of surfaces. This instrument was used to study iron undergoing oxidation at 500°C. It was found that the electron current in the scanning electron microscope was low enough (about 10-atrzp) to have no observable effect on the growth of the oxide. "Armco " iron, when oxidized, exhibited an oxide film whose thickness and whiskey population varied with pain orientation; but purer iron, when oxidized, exhibited no such pain dependence and whisker occurrence appeared to be caused by impurities. UNTIL recently most surfaces of opaque specimens could either be studied with a light microscope or, if higher resolution was required, by viewing a replica of the surface in a transmission electron microscope. Direct electron microscopy of a surface has, in general, proved difficult owing to excessive foreshortening and the poor image quality obtained. The scanning electron microscope, however, offers an alternative method of directly viewing a surface without these disadvantages. At low magnification it offers a much larger depth of focus than the light microscope, and at high magnifications it offers much higher resolution (about 100Å). PRINCIPLE OF THE SCANNING ELECTRON MICROSCOPE A schematic diagram is shown in Fig. 1. The electron optical system consists of a gun followed by a series of lenses which focus the electron beam onto the surface of the specimen. The beam is scanned in a rectangular raster across the specimen surface and, by amplifying the secondary electron current from the 'pecimen, a picture of the specimen surface is built UP sequentially on the face of the display cathode-ray tube. The magnification of such a system is given by the ratio of the scan amplitude on the display cathode-ray tube to