Addicted To Nature

I found out what the “HOLY SHIT WTF” Machine In My Lab <|HSWTFMIML|> was after poking my nose around. Everyone replied its an XPS, but when I asked for the long form, they were all like “err, erm.. X Ray Photo Spectroscopy or X Ray (dunno something) or X Ray (something) spectroscopy”…

Its an X-Ray Photoelectron (or photoemission) Spectroscopy machine. An XPS, also called a UPS, U for ultra violet. They got this gleaming gleaming huge thing from Kratos, a Kratos Axis Ultra. It fills up the entire room, and in my nerdy opinion, it really looks cool:

An XPS machine shoots photons at samples and detects the photoelectrons that are emitted by the photoelectric effect, basically. Kai Siegbahn got a Nobel prize for inventing this thing (his dad got a Nobel prize too, =_= ). Initially it was called an ESCA, Electron Spectroscopy for Chemical Analysis, then it seems that they changed it to XPS, probably becuz the X looks cool. The one that uses ultraviolet light was invented by David Turner at Imperial College (Wiki).

I think basically, the machine just shoots photons and detects the emitted electrons, charting it with the number of electrons versus the energy. These peaks can be used to characterize many things, such as the element that was blasted, or the energy level that was blasted (1s, 2s, 3s etc). But I don’t know if every single electron in every single element is unique. As in, an electron from hydrogen 1s wouldn’t have the same energy as that of helium 1s. If it is unique, then this machine can perhaps identify all the things I said above with relative ease. Same goes for alloys, mixtures? I dont know.

You could also use lasers, temperature, pressure, force fields (not the Star Trek kind, I mean, electric and magnetic fields) ,what not, to excite your sample and while its doing so, blast it with photons to investigate all kinds of properties. Of course, this must all be done in ultra high vacuum conditions. From what I read here and there, it seems that this technique is only useful for surface analysis (5nm) since only the electrons on the very top surface will be able to escape and hit the detectors. Those further below will be deflected within the material or reabsorbed within the lattice.

Heres another image here. Seems that the Kratos Axis Ultra has full capabilities of X-Ray, Ion and SEM all together. Thats why theres a huge steel ball jutting out with many guns, the guns are probably the emitters, electron guns etc. Perhaps its also capable of AES, Auger Electron Spectroscopy.

Where is a nice website that lists all the cool machines in this world? I will take a picture of the thing in my lab again the next time I go and upload it.

Links:

SLAC Surface and Materials Science, Wiki, The picture above.