On the Energy Distribution of Secondary Electrons Emitted from Metals

Abstract

  The energy distribution of secondary electrons emitted from several metals has been investigated theoretically and a comparison of Monte Carlo simulation result with an experimental measurement has been made. The Monte Carlo simulation of cascade secondary electron production is based on the use of a dielectric function for the treatment of electron inelastic scattering and secondary excitation, and on the use of Mott cross section for describing electron elastic scattering. The calculation reproduces well the weak features presented in the experimental energy spectra of secondary electrons measured with a cylindrical mirror analyzer. The result indicates that, the weak feature is resulted from the directly emitted secondary electrons after generation without energy loss processes and, thus, carries the characteristic energy transferred from the loss energy of the incident electrons. However, during their transportation to the surface much of the cascade secondary electrons have suffered quite energy losses and to be presented as the large background.