Quantitative analysis of complex Auger spectra by least‐squares fitting with prefiltering of spectra

Abstract

The 'filter-fit' method, which was originaHy developed for the analysis of energy dispersive x-ray data, has been applied to the quantitative analysis of Auger spectra for the first time. It is a digital peak deconvolution technique in the presence of the continuum background using least-squares fitting calculations, including the prefiltering of spectra. To evaluate this method, composite-known spectra digitally composed of Cr, 0 and Ni standard spectra were prepared. For the deconvolution of Cr and 0 peaks under the influence of the Ni peak tail, the present method showed remarkable advantage over the conventional least-squares fitting without prefiltering. As a digital filter for prefiltering, derivative filters of different orders and 'top-hat' filter were examined. In derivative filters, it was found that there is an optimum order in the balance of advantage of suppressing the background and disadvantage of losing peak intensity. The 'top-hat' filter is a very practical filter in both background suppression and noise attenuation.

Coating of Ti–6Al–4V alloy substrates with Ti–N films by reactive d.c. sputtering

“…Thus, the overlapped peaks in the N(E) spectra were resolved into the nitrogen peak and the titanium peak using the least-squares fitting (LSF) procedure after prefiltering of the spectra, developed by Sekine et al 9,10 The AES signal of Al KLL was also acquired to determine the position of the interface between the film and the substrate, where an increase in aluminium concentration in the depth direction might be detected.…”

American society for testing and materials. Standard guide for background subtraction techniques in Auger electron spectroscopy (E995‐89)

“…The N(E) distribution, EN(E) distribution, or the areas under Auger peaks over specified energy ranges can be obtained directly using these techniques. 7.10 Digital Filtration (19,20) -1n a method borrowed from energydispersive X-ray spectroscopy, a "tophat" digital frequency filter is applied to an Auger spectrum to suppress the slowly-varying background continuum, while the more rapidly varying Auger peaks remain unaffected.…”