Soft-x-ray induced core-level photoemission as a probe of hot-electron dynamics in SiO2

Abstract

The line shape of the bulk Si 2p core-level photoemission peak is found to be strongly dependent on the thickness of SiO2 overlayers through which the electrons are transmitted. This effect is strongly energy dependent. We demonstrate that it arises from strong energy-dependent carrier relaxation in SiO2, and show how the effect may be used, in conjunction with Monte Carlo simulations, to extract energy-dependent scattering rates for electron-phonon and electron-electron scattering. © 1990 The American Physical Society.