Article Abstracts | June 2006
The complete article appears in the June 2006 issue of Photonics Spectra. If you do not have a copy of this issue,
e-mail us a request. Be sure to include your street address or fax number.
Lasers Emerge as a Tool for the Direct Study of Electrons in Solids
Lasers are a powerful complement to their synchrotron-based counterparts as sources of high-energy photons for angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy.
by Jake D. Koralek and D.S. Dessau, University of Colorado at Boulder
Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy is the most direct way to observe the quantum-mechanical structure of electrons in solids and one of the key tools used to understand the complex electronic interactions that lead to high-temperature superconductivity.1
In these experiments, high-energy photons eject electrons from the material of interest. Because the electron momentum is conserved in this process, the angular distribution of the ejected electrons — or photoelectrons — is representative of the initial quantum-mechanical distribution of electronic states in the solid. Using an electron spectrometer that measures this photoelectron distribution with very high energy and momentum resolution, physicists can study the intricate details of the electronic interactions in the solid...
Start a discussion on this article or any photonics topic in the Photonics.com Community Forum