Measurement of KL and LM resonant Raman scattering cross sections with a proton-induced x-ray beam

Abstract

The resonant Raman effect has been described as an inelastic scattering process occurring when the energy of the exciting x-ray beam approaches from below the energy of an absorption edge of a target element. It produces a scattered photon with a characteristic maximum energy and the emission of an inner-shell electron. A high monochromatic x-ray beam produced by protons was utilized for the measurement of the KL type of resonant Raman scattering (RRS) cross sections in V and Cr and of the LM ones in La and Ce. In the case of V and Cr targets, the fluorescence yields of the KL-RRS process were also extracted, while the fine-structure splitting in a LM-RRS spectrum was observed for the first time. The influence of RRS into different topics of x-ray spectrometry, like the quantitative x-ray flourescence analysis, the theoretical calculations of the mass attenuation coefficients or the shape of characteristic x-rays emitted from low Z thick targets, is also discussed.