Temperature-Dependent Sputtering with Gas Cluster Ions: Numerical Simulation

Temperature dependences of the copper sputtering yield by argon cluster ions in the temperature range from 300 to 1100 K (0.8 of the melting point) have been studied by numerical simulations using molecular dynamics method. The sizes of argon clusters with a fixed energy of 10 keV were from 50 to 500 atoms. It has been found that the temperature dependence of the sputtering yield becomes more pronounced with increasing cluster size, i.e., with decreasing specific energy of its atoms. The results are compared with the thermal spike model.