Surface Analysis I. Diffraction Methods

Abstract

Diffraction techniques utilizing electrons or x-ray photons are widely used to characterize the structure of surfaces. The structural information is gained conventionally from the analysis of the particles/waves scattered elastically by the crystal. The intensity of the diffracted beams contains information on the atomic arrangement within a unit cell. The spatial distribution of the diffracted beams tells us about the crystal lattice. The evaluation of the crystal lattice is straightforward, as the diffraction pattern is directly related to the crystal reciprocal lattice by the condition:

$$k - {k_0} = {G_{hkl}}$$

((1))

.