LASER PHOTOELECTRON PROJECTION MICROSCOPY OF INSULATING SAMPLES WITH SUBWAVELENGTH SPATIAL-RESOLUTION

Operation of a laser-driven photoelectron projection microscope is ana lyzed in the case of low-conductivity samples. Under certain condition s, even with ''perfectly'' insulating samples, one can obtain photoele ctron images with a high magnification factor and spatial resolution s maller than the laser wavelength owing to the effect that the diple fi eld of a sample polarized by a strong external electric field has on t he motion of emitted photoelectrons. The experimental investigation of lithium fluoride and glass samples reported in this paper can be cons idered a qualitative confirmation of the suggested model. (C) 1997 Ame rican Institute of Physics.