Email from AVS Read Papers from the Recent Collection on Higher Energy X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy   Read Collection for FREE for a Limited Time! HAXPES spectra of bulk WS2 with Cr Kα excitation

Nondestructive three-dimensional visualization of buried interfaces in multilayer thin films is central to semiconductor device characterization. Angle-resolved

Monochromatic Al Kα (1486.6 eV) and monochromatic Cr Kα (5414.8 eV) radiation sources were used to acquire x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and hard x-ray

The BL46XU beamline at SPring-8 has been restructured for hard X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (HAXPES), featuring two specialized HAXPES instruments and advanced X-ray optics for high-throughput and ambient-pressure measurements. This article outlines the beamline design, performance and recent scientific achievements enabled by these upgrades.

We have developed and successfully tested new environmental liquid cells for HAXPES studies using specially designed thin, low-stress silicon nitride membranes (15 to 25 nm thickness). The novel aspect is the fabrication of the membranes considering the geometry of the experimental setup, the dimensions of the beam and the use of platinum stripes to efficiently localize the membranes. The membranes are robust, able to withstand the 1 bar pressure difference between the liquid and vacuum, and the intense beam.

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POLEVAL provides a software toolbox for collaborative, persistent and reproducible analysis of XPS experiments. It allows to treat, analyse and visualise the results of an extended experimental campaign in a single python notebook in a consistent manner. Managing experimental data in adequate objects enables experimentalists to process and analyse measurements in very few lines of code, so as to provide decision aids through online data analysis during e.g. beamtime experiments. The persistent and self-documentary style of the notebook-based analysis allows for easy communication of intermediate results and enables progressive refinements into publishable figures or exporting the results to other programs. The toolbox facilitates various routines for data treatment (normalization, cropping, etc.) and aggregation of spectra into groups to analyse trends. It also enables quantitative analysis with three major functions: First, normalization to the photoionization cross-section and probability of emission into the analyser cone allows for quantitative comparisons between intensities from different core levels. The integrated haxquantpy package allows easy retrieval of literature values for this purpose. Second, an extensive fitting functionality is implemented to treat groups of spectra together, rather than spectrum-by-spectrum. This grouping allows reinforcing the fit algorithm with prior knowledge, such as the equivalence of peak widths or positions between spectra, which enables for more consistent, and importantly, more confident fit results for sets of potentially noisy spectra. Third, a simple formalism to estimate the thickness of adsorbate layers based on the ratio between the substrate's and adsorbate's XPS signal is implemented.

POLEVAL provides a software toolbox for collaborative, persistent and reproducible analysis of XPS experiments. It allows to treat, analyse and visualise the results of an extended experimental campaign in a single python notebook in a consistent manner. Managing experimental data in adequate objects enables experimentalists to process and analyse measurements in very few lines of code, so as to provide decision aids through online data analysis during e.g. beamtime experiments. The persistent and self-documentary style of the notebook-based analysis allows for easy communication of intermediate results and enables progressive refinements into publishable figures or exporting the results to other programs. The toolbox facilitates various routines for data treatment (normalization, cropping, etc.) and aggregation of spectra into groups to analyse trends. It also enables quantitative analysis with three major functions: First, normalization to the photoionization cross-section and probability of emission into the analyser cone allows for quantitative comparisons between intensities from different core levels. The integrated haxquantpy package allows easy retrieval of literature values for this purpose. Second, an extensive fitting functionality is implemented to treat groups of spectra together, rather than spectrum-by-spectrum. This grouping allows reinforcing the fit algorithm with prior knowledge, such as the equivalence of peak widths or positions between spectra, which enables for more consistent, and importantly, more confident fit results for sets of potentially noisy spectra. Third, a simple formalism to estimate the thickness of adsorbate layers based on the ratio between the substrate's and adsorbate's XPS signal is implemented.