Back to Search
Start Over
Investigation of the influence of surface composition on the charge state distribution of ∼keV hydrogen exiting thin carbon foils for space plasma instrumentation
- Source :
- Advances in Space Research. 57:2420-2426
- Publication Year :
- 2016
- Publisher :
- Elsevier BV, 2016.
-
Abstract
- Energetic neutral atom (ENA) imaging techniques have become a powerful tool for remotely probing plasma environments in space. ENA imagers cover energies from 0.01 keV up to a few MeV, and they use different techniques to cover such a broad energy range. Most of them convert the ENA into a charged particle to remove the converted ENA from the initial neutral direction. In the >∼0.2 keV/nuc to 10’s of keV/nuc range, the conversion subsystem is usually an ultra-thin carbon foil. The sensitivity of ENA imagers based on charge conversion by carbon foils is driven by the ability of these foils to convert a neutral atom into an ion. The charge state distribution after the carbon foils is a strong function of the chemical and physical properties of the exit surface. In this study, we analyze the composition and structure of the surface using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The surface is roughly 88% carbon and 12% oxygen, forming strong C O bonds. Annealing the foil lowers the oxygen content to about 9%. We coat the surface of the foils with Au, Al 2 O 3 , or MgO. We compare the exit charge state distributions of hydrogen prior to and post coatings. While no significant difference is observed in the exit charge state for the Au and Al 2 O 3 coatings, there is a slight decrease of the positive fraction after MgO. The annealing of the foil has the benefit of reducing the angular scattering of hydrogen by a factor of ∼1.2. This is a significant improvement that has the potential to increase sensitivity of ENA imagers.
- Subjects :
- Atmospheric Science
Materials science
010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences
Energetic neutral atom
Hydrogen
Scattering
Aerospace Engineering
chemistry.chemical_element
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Plasma
01 natural sciences
Charged particle
Ion
Geophysics
X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy
chemistry
Space and Planetary Science
Physics::Space Physics
0103 physical sciences
General Earth and Planetary Sciences
Atomic physics
010303 astronomy & astrophysics
FOIL method
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 02731177
- Volume :
- 57
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Advances in Space Research
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi...........f907cf69f475581c6157619b3307f91a