A simple equation to determine the shell thicknesses of core-shell nanoparticles based on XPS data of their elemental composition.

A simple analytical expression is obtained relating the radius of the core, the thickness of the shell of nanoparticles, and the intensities of X-ray photoelectron lines from the core and shell, recorded during one experiment. The effective evaluation of the proposed equation was verified by comparison with the results of calculations of the parameters of core-shell nanoparticles (NPs) using known methods, as well as by comparing the results of ratios between the radius and thickness of the shell of specific NPs and their evaluations using the transmission electron microscopy method. The formula proposed in this work also allows using EDS data to estimate the core-shell parameters of nanoparticles.

Phonon, plasmon and electronic properties of surfaces and interfaces of periodic W/Si and Si/W multilayers.

The phonon and plasmon excitations and electronic properties of interfaces of periodic W/Si and Si/W multilayer structures were investigated. The Boson band originated from quasilocal surface acoustic phonons for ultrathin Si layers, excited by Raman scattering. In confined Si layers, a small fraction of crystalline Si nanoclusters were embedded within a large volume fraction of amorphous Si (a-Si) nanoclusters.