Many-electron effect in the resonant Auger electron spectroscopy spectra of adsorbates

Abstract

It is shown by a many-body theory that a resonantly excited core hole state in a chemisorbed molecule such as CO/Ni, CO/Pd, and CO/Pt relaxes to a fully relaxed one, i.e., the ionized core hole state of the smallest binding energy observed by photoelectron spectroscopy, before the core hole decays so that the resonant Auger electron spectroscopy (RAES) spectrum shows the normal Auger decay spectrum. It is shown by a many-body theory that the Auger peaks on the higher kinetic energy (K.E.) side in the RAES or AES spectrum, i.e., so called back-bonding peaks, are the two-hole states consisting of a valence hole and a hole in the adsorbate–substrate hybrid states below the substrate Fermi level. The latter hole is the change in the density of the hybrid states occupied by the screening electron from the core hole state to the valence-hole state. The difference between the back-bonding peak energy and the single valence-hole energy provides an important information about the change in the density of the hybrid states occupied by the screening electron from the core hole state to the valence-hole state. The difference between the RAES spectrum measured at the resonance energy and the AES spectrum measured at far above the ionization limit shows the competition between relaxation and decay of shakeup satellites such as the charge transfer (CT) shakeup. The relaxation rate of the CT shakeup state can be determined by Auger-photoelectron coincidence spectroscopy (APECS).