Quantitative Secondary Neutral Mass Spectrometry Analysis of Alloys and Oxide-Metal-Interfaces

For the chemical analysis of a solid sample a number of physical methods have been developed besides the classical, mostly time consuming methods of wet chemistry. Such analytical techniques are e.g. the optical emission and absorption spectroscopy or X-ray fluorescence, but also more recent techniques as X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), Auger Electron Spectroscopy (AES), Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy (SIMS), Ion Scattering Spectroscopy (ISS) and others. This second group of analytical methods is of particular interest because of the possibility to determine the chemical composition at the very surface of the sample, and to obtain concentration depth profiles when the sample material is removed by sputtering.