Determination of the phase distribution in nitrogen-implanted iron from conversion electron Mossbauer spectroscopy data

A new deconvolution procedure of conversion electron Mossbauer spectroscopy (CEMS) data based on the computer simulations of nitride phase transformat ions is described. The method uses the depth distribution of impurity atoms extracted from the Monte Carlo simulations and the phase contributions to the CEMS spectra to calculate the phase distribution profiles. The procedur e has been applied to nitrogen implanted iron and provided a significantly extended amount of information on the phase transformations in the FeN syst em available from the analysis of the Mossbauer data. (C) 2000 American Ins titute of Physics. [S0021-8979(00)08714-4].