Formation of isolated islands by size-selected copper nanocluster deposition

Abstract

Deposition of size-selected metal nanoclusters on a substrate with very low kinetic energy helps to keep the clusters intact with respect to their shape and size as compared to clusters in ight condition. Here we report formation of isolated monodispersed islands of copper of desired size on carbon film by deposition of size selected copper clusters (~ 3 nm) in soft-landing method. Copper clusters were produced by a magnetron based gas aggregation type source equipped with a quardrupole mass filter (QMF) to select size of clusters before landing. Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) study shows that diffusion of islands is very low.