An analytical expression for electron elastic scattering cross section from atoms and molecules in 1.0 keV to 1.0 MeV energy range

In this Letter, an expression is presented to calculate elastic scattering cross sections for incident electrons as a function of both energy and atomic number in the energy range between 1 keV and 1 MeV for materials with effective atomic number between 3 and 18. The expression we present has a rather simple analytical form which gives accurate results that are in very good agreement with the results calculated by a relativistic partial-wave expansion method. Hence, this equation can be employed accurately and efficiently in a continuous manner, without the need to go through rather large look-up tables, thus making the whole process quick, efficient and removing possible computational errors that may arise from the efforts of interpolation.