Thin-film alloys of Bi1−x Sbx produced by ion-beam mixing and their thermoelectric properties

Ion-beam mixing in the Bi/Sb system using Ne+, Ar+, and Kr+ ions in the energy range 40–110 keV has been investigated by Rutherford backscattering analysis. The mixing is shown to be temperature independent in the region of 40–250 K; at higher temperatures the mixing per ion increases rapidly with temperature. Initially, a square-root dependence of the mixing on the ion dose was observed. At higher doses a saturation effect is obtained as the Sb becomes uniformly distributed in depth throughout the film. Also, the mixing was found to increase linearly with the energy deposited into atomic displacement collisions at the Bi/Sb interface. Alloys of Bi1−x Sbx (0