Determination of the surface excitation correction in elastic peak electron spectroscopy for selected conducting polymers

SEPs for eight selected conducting polymers (polythiophenes, polyaniline and polyethylene) undoped and doped with Pd were determined by EPES using Ag, Ni and Si reference materials for electron energies between 0.2 and 2.0 keV. The mean percentage deviations between IMFPs uncorrected for surface excitations and those calculated with the predictive formulae of Gries and Tanuma et al. were 4.32 and 27.32%, respectively. Relevant deviations for IMFPs corrected for surface excitations were 2.97 and 22.90%, respectively.