Fast atom diffraction at metal surface

Fast atoms with energies from 300 eV up to 1.7 keV are scattered under a grazing angle of incidence from a clean and flat Ni(1 1 0) surface. For scattering under ”axial surface channeling” conditions, we observe - as reported recently for insulator and semiconductor surfaces - defined diffraction patterns in the angular intensity distributions for scattered fast 3He and 4He atoms. We have investigated the domain of scattering conditions where decoherence phenomena are sufficiently small in order to observe for metal targets quantum scattering of fast atomic projectiles. As a consequence, fast atom diffraction appears to be a general technique with a wide range of applicability in surface science.