SECONDARY-ELECTRON EMISSION ENHANCEMENT AND DEFECT CONTRAST FROM DIAMOND FOLLOWING EXPOSURE TO ATOMIC-HYDROGEN

Polished nominal (100) surfaces of four types of diamonds were exposed to atomic hydrogen by hot filament cracking of H-2 gas or by immersio n in a H-2 plasma discharge. Both types IIa and IIb (100) diamond surf aces exhibited the following characteristic changes: (a) secondary ele ctron (SE) yield increased by a factor of approximately 30 as measured in a scanning electron microscope (SEM), (b) near-surface, nontopogra phical defects were observable directly using the conventional SE mode of the SEM, (c) surface conductance increased by up to 10 orders of m agnitude. These changes were observed only weakly in nitrogen-containi ng types Ia and Ib diamonds.