Enhanced backscatter from monodisperse contaminants on a substrate

Enhanced backscatter has been used to characterize rough, irregular substra tes and polydispersions of contaminants on a substrate. For monodisperse co ntaminants, the enhanced-backscatter peak can be obscured by the structure of the total intensity signal. Averaging backscatter intensities from a sub strate contaminated by monodisperse contaminants when the system is illumin ated by plane waves of different incident angles removes the structure of t he individual intensity signals, isolating the backscatter peak. The result ing peak contains information which can be used to characterize the contami nants. We demonstrate this technique by modeling the size and shape of this peak for monodisperse spherical contaminants on a substrate and comparing these results with experimental measurements. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.