Secondary electron emissions from diamond surfaces

Secondary electron emissions from diamond surfaces have been studied using polycrystalline films with different dopants, boron and nitrogen, and varied coping concentrations and surface terminations. Two reasons for the very high secondary-electron yields from H-terminated diamond surfaces are the presence of the wide band gap and low or negative electron affinity at the surface. The latter permits the low-energy secondary electrons that reach the surface to escape into vacuum. The former allows low-energy electrons to have large escape depths.