Ion guiding through capillaries in uncoated Al2O3 membranes

We made an experimental study on ion guiding through capillaries in uncoated Al2O3 membranes using a variety of ions such as O1+, O3+, and O6+. The incident energy was varied within the range of 30–150keV. The results were compared with others using coated PET and Al2O3 capillary membranes as well as with the so-called scaling law discovered by Stolterfoht and his co-workers. Good agreement of our results with the scaling law was found. However, our membranes showed extraordinarily strong guiding ability. The reason lies in that our membranes were uncoated. A slower charge drift speed along the insulating capillary wall and a much larger equilibrium charge Q∞ seems to exist in our experiment.