The nuclear microprobe — PIXE, PIGE, RBS, NRA and ERDA

Abstract

Like the electron microprobe (Chapter 2), the scanning nuclear microprobe uses a focused beam of charged particles to excite samples. The focused beam usually consists of protons, but can include heavier particles such as alpha particles, oxygen ions or sulphur ions. In modern instruments, the beam can be scanned and rastered to produce line scans and two-dimensional elemental maps in addition to performing spot analyses. This instrumentation is often referred to as the scanning proton microprobe (or SPM). The incident proton beam is most commonly used to generate characteristic secondary X-rays from a sample in an analogous way to the electrons in the electron microprobe. In the nuclear microprobe literature this phenomenon is known as particle-induced X-ray emission or PIXE.