Nozières and De Dominicis developed a theory of these singularities involving a competition between an “orthogonality catastrophe” and an exciton effect predicted by Mahan. For 10 points each:
[10m] Name these features displayed by the absorption and emission spectra of metals. One of these features corresponds to a jump in absorbance just above the K-shell energy.
ANSWER: edge singularities [or absorption edges; accept K-edge; accept, but DO NOT REVEAL, Fermi edge]
[10e] One absorption edge occurs at an energy named for this scientist, which is the energy of the highest occupied state in a metal at zero temperature.
ANSWER: Enrico Fermi [accept Fermi edge; accept Fermi level; accept Fermi energy]
[10h] Fermi edge singularities are used to calibrate this technique for metallic samples. This surface-analysis technique, which was pioneered by Siegbahn, is somewhat controversially calibrated using “adventitious carbon” for organic samples.
ANSWER: X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy [or XPS; prompt on photoelectron spectroscopy or PES]
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