Nano-roughness limits the emittance of electron beams that can be generated by high efficiency photocathodes, such as the thermally reacted alkali antimonide thin films. However there is an urgent need for photocathodes that can produce an order of magnitude or more lower emittance than present day systems in order to increase the transverse coherence width of the electron beam. In this paper we demonstrate a method for producing alkali antimonide cathodes with near atomic smoothness with high reproducibility.
