I am going to investigate the surface of a powder sample using FESEM but I am wondering weather I would be able to use a conductive tape!?
My sample particles size are of several microns to several tens of micron. As well, the surface of particle is important for me so it is not sensible to mount and polish it.
Yes, you can.
apply some conductive tape (mostly people prefer carbon tape) on the stub and put some powder over it. you can also apply a bit pressure over it to make sure that powder is stuck to the tape and will not come out of it when the machine will making the vacuum.
If the powder is conductive its good, if not than you need to do some conductive coating over it.
Conductive tape is usually used in case of thin film deposited on glass substrate. But there is no such problem in your case. Its routine to use carbon or copper tape on metallic stub to hold powder.
Yes, you can. For powder sample it is better to disperse in ethanol and using pipette put 1-2 drops of ethanolic dispersion on conductive carbon tape and dry it for 10mins at 40C.
Mohammed Khalifa
Thanks a lot! I did the same but over a piece of glass and so I had to make it metallized as well! Anyway, got good results.
I'd like also to say thanks to Chandra Bhal Singh, Akeshwar Singh Yadav and Rishi Upadhyay
.
yes you can use for example Iron borides
Iron borides should be conductive enough to observe without any coating.
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