PHOTOEMISSION ENERGY-DISTRIBUTION MEASUREMENTS IN A SIMPLE METAL - A MODERN PHYSICS UNDERGRADUATE LABORATORY

Measurement of energy distribution curves (EDCs) is one of the more po werful techniques for investigating the electronic band structure of s olids. It would be profitable for undergraduate students to perform an experiment introducing them to this aspect of modem spectroscopy. In this paper we describe an arrangement we use in our course of modem ph ysics for engineering students utilizing a commercial photocell. After a theoretical background on the photoemission process in metal, we pr esent measurements on the EDCs obtained by graphical differentiation o f the I-V characteristics of the photocell and by using an ac method w here the differentiation is performed electronically.