Guided transmission of Ne7+ ions through nanocapillaries in PET: dependence on the tilt angle

Abstract We measured the transmission of 3 keV Ne 7+ ions through nanocapillaries of 100 nm diameter and 10 μm length in a PET polymer foil. The capillaries were produced before the transmission experiments by etching tracks of fast xenon ions. The foils were tilted up to 15° for which the incident ions are forced to approach the capillary surface. After a characteristic time the majority of Ne 7+ ions were found to be transmitted in their initial charge state. The angular distributions of the transmitted Ne 7+ projectiles reveals a propagation of the ions parallel to the capillary axis. This indicates that the ions are guided through the capillaries. The capillary guiding is the result of deposit of charges in a self-organizing process. A non-linear model is presented to interpret the experimental observation. The analysis exhibits a significant dependence of the ion transmission on the tilt angle.