Asymmetries in transition metal XPS spectra: metal nanoparticle structure, and interaction with the graphene-structured substrate surface.

Transition-metal XPS spectra have traditionally been considered to possess a natural asymmetry, extending to the high-binding-energy side. This is based on the fact that these spectra have generally been found experimentally to have such an asymmetry, as well as on the confirmation of asymmetry offered by the Doniach-Sunjić equation, an equation based on the proposal that the conduction electron scattering amplitude for interband absorption or emission in metals, at the Fermi level, is a singularity. Our discovery that metal nanoparticles, prepared under vacuum and characterized without exposure to air, have symmetric peaks, which become asymmetric with time, informed us that these peak asymmetries have other sources. On the basis of our belief that all metal spectra are composed of symmetric peaks, where the asymmetries are attributed to overlapping minor peaks that are consistent with known physical and chemical phenomena associated with that metal, we have shown that, for the metals that we have studied, these asymmetries contain much information, otherwise unavailable, on the structures, contaminants, oxidation, and interfacial interactions of nanoparticle surfaces. The existence of this information has been demonstrated for several metals, and its value is shown by its use in explaining the strong interfacial bonding of the nanoparticles with substrates having graphene structures. A possible future research direction is offered in the field of metal-metal interactions in nanoparticle alloys.