Secondary electronic processes and the structure of X-ray photoelectron spectra of lanthanides in oxygen-containing compounds

Abstract

X-ray photoelectron spectra of lanthanide compounds in the binding energy range 0–1250 eV beside the spin–orbitally split doublets exhibit fine structure. In particular, in the low-energy spectral range 0–50 eV such structure appears most likely due to the formation of the inner (IVMO) and outer (OVMO) valence molecular orbitals. The many-body perturbation shows up in the spectra of all the studied electronic shells but with different probabilities, while the multiplet splitting and dynamic effect in the spectra of just some inner shells. The present work studies the X-ray photoelectron spectral structure of lanthanide (La–Lu except for Pm) oxides and orthoniobates due to the secondary electronic processes accompanying the photoemission from the inner shells: many-body perturbation and dynamic effect. As a result, for example, the relative intensity of the line due to the many-body perturbation (shake-up process) with Δ E sat≈4 eV for LaNbO 4 was found to decrease with decreasing of the binding energy of the inner electrons from 0.72 ( E b for La 3d 5/2=834.8 eV) to 0.28 ( E b for La 4d 5/2=102.9 eV). The full-width at half-maximum of the Ln 3d 5/2 line of lanthanide oxides and orthoniobates decreases as the atomic number Z of lanthanide grows in the range 58≤ Z≤67 to the middle of the lanthanide row, and then increases. This agrees with the fact that for the beginning of the lanthanide row the Ln 3d 5/2 photoemission is accompanied by the shake-up process, while for the second half of the row—by the shake-down. It is important to note that it is connected with the Ln 4f binding energy change relative to the OVMO in compounds. The present work also confirms experimentally that the dynamic effect due to the gigantic Coster–Kronig transitions observed in the Ln 4p spectra takes place within the inner Ln 4p, 4d and outer Ln 4f shells with formation of the additional two-hole final state Ln 4p 6 4d 8 4f n+1 . The influence of the chemical environment on the Ln 4p spectral structure due to the dynamic effect was also studied.