Energy loss of slow Ne ions in Pt and Ag from TOF-MEIS and Monte-Carlo simulations

Time-Of-Flight Medium Energy Ion Scattering (TOF-MEIS) experiments were performed to investigate the different energy loss mechanisms for slow Ne ions (a few keV/nucleon) in polycrystalline thin films of Ag and Pt deposited on Si. To disentangle electronic (Se) and nuclear (Sn) contributions to the stopping power, Monte-Carlo (MC) simulations using the TRBS (TRim for BackScattering) code were conducted. The plateau-width of the experimental signal recorded in backscattering geometry was analyzed in order to extract additional information on the effective nuclear stopping. Electronic stopping powers were found to show the expected velocity dependence while the contribution from nuclear stopping was found low. The implications for experiments performed to study energy loss or related parameters are discussed.