“Nanoscale Self-Organization Induced by Ion Bombardment of Solid Surfaces”

Mark Bradley

Monday, November 8th at 4:00pm

Bombarding a solid surface with a broad ion beam can produce a remarkable variety of self-assembled nanoscale patterns, including periodic height modulations or “ripples” and hexagonal arrays of nanodots.  The emergence of these patterns is not just fascinating — in the future, ion bombardment may prove to be an important tool in the fabrication of nanostructures.

As an introduction to the field, the question of why ion bombardment often produces ripples on a solid surface will be addressed.  [Read more…]