Knowledge Base

The Energies Listed are Binding Energies!

Al 2s: 119 eV

Al 2p: 74 eV

The Energies Listed are Binding Energies!

Overlaps for Al 2p (primary emission)

• Br 3d (68 V)
• Pt 4f (71 eV)
• Cu 3p (74 eV)
• Cr 3s (74 V)
• Ru 4s (75 eV)
• Cs 4d (77 eV)
• In 4p (77 eV)

Overlaps for Al 2s

• Nd 4d (118 eV)
• Cu 3s (120 eV)
• Pm 4d (121 eV)
• In 4s (122 eV)
• Ge 3p (122 eV)
• I 4p (123 eV)

Energies listed are Kinetic Energies!

Al KLL: ~ 1390 eV

When analysing aluminium, it is often sensible to collect an extended region to the higher binding energy side, in order to capture any plasmons and enable accurate background modelling.

Aluminium metal plasmons, identified in reference 1.

Whilst it is commonplace to fit the sharp metallic doublet as a pair of peaks, and the alumina overlayer as a single voight-type convolution (due to the small doublet separation – 0.44 eV – relative to the broader oxide peaks for Al 2p), it is nonetheless good practice to fit every species as a doublet – particularly when deconvoluting multiple species.

Al native oxide fit, using a metal lineshape of LA(1,2.44,69), and an oxide lineshape of GL(30)

Whilst this no doubt gives a good approximation for native oxides, and determining overlayer thicknesses – decoupling of chemical species surely benefits from a thorough treatment of the spin-orbit doublet in order to minimise errors in fitting shoulders and broadenings – such as in the below example studying Al-grafted overlayers onto a silica interface from Parlett et al.

Al 2p fitting for a deconvoluted multiple state composition – reproduced with permission from author.