Ultramicrotomy of diamond films for TEM cross-section analysis

Ultramicrotomy has been used to prepare TEM cross-sections of typical hard dielectric, semiconductor, and metal coatings, providing a critical capability in the study of structure-property relationships of thin films. Ultramicrotomy of thin film coatings requires meticulous attention to technique and handling. The sample to be microtomed must be very small, well bonded to the epoxy embedding medium, and precisely oriented. In this article we report the ability to microtome TEM cross-sections of diamond and cubic boron-nitride (cBN) coatings.