Reneutralization time of surface silicon ions on a field emitter

In this work, the lifetime of silicon (Si) ions generated through photoionization of Si surface atoms from a field emitter was measured. Under low-intensity fs laser pulse illumination, a linear dependence of the number of evaporated ions per pulse on the laser intensity was observed. A simple model was developed to explain this linear dependence and to estimate the rate of success of the field evaporation process. It is shown that the number of evaporated ions per pulse depends on the standing field applied to the Si surface, demonstrating the existence of an ionic energy barrier for Si ions. The lifetime of these ions was estimated to be 0.5 ps.