An official website of the United States government
Here’s how you know
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock (
) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.
Secondary-Electron Energy Distribution in High-Energy Photoemission
Published
Author(s)
David R. Penn
Abstract
We have calculated the energy distribution of secondary electrons observed in core-level XPS or core-level synchrotron photoemission experiments on Al. The secondary electrons are produced when the photoexcited primary electrons scatter inelastically from the valence electrons via the mechanisms of bulk and surface plasmon production and electron-hole production. The scattering cross sections for these events are determined from the Lindhard dielectric function, although the plasmon dispersion and broadening are taken from experimental measurements. Multiple scattering is taken into account by means of the Wolff-Spencer-Fano integral equation for the electron-energy distribution. The calculated results are compared to experiment.