Electron emission from foils and biological materials after proton impact

Electron emission spectra from thin metal foils with thin layers of water frozen on them (amorphous solid water) after fast proton impact have been measured and have been simulated in liquid water using the event-by-event track structure code PARTRAC. The electron transport model of PARTRAC has been extended to simulate electron transport down to 1 eV by including low-energy phonon, vibrational and electronic excitations as measured by Michaud et al. [Michaud, M., Wen, A., Sanche, L., 2003. Cross sections for low-energy (1-100 eV) electron elastic and inelastic scattering in amorphous ice. Radiat. Res. 159, 3-22] for amorphous ice. Simulated liquid water yields follow in general the amorphous solid water measurements at higher energies, but overestimate them significantly at energies below 50 eV.