Photoacoustic spectroscopy Photoacoustic spectroscopy Photoacoustic spectroscopy is the measurement of the effect of absorbed electromagnetic energy (particularly of light) on matter by means of acoustic detection. The discovery of the photoacoustic effect dates to 1880 when Alexander Graham Bell showed that thin discs emitted sound when exposed to a beam of sunlight that was rapidly interrupted with a rotating slotted disk. The absorbed energy from the light causes local heating, generating a thermal expansion which creates a pressure wave or sound. Later Bell showed that materials exposed to the non-visible portions of the solar spectrum (i.e., the infrared and the ultraviolet) can
Ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy seen a considerable revival with the increasing availability of synchrotron light sources which provide a wide range of monochromatic photon energies. Ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy Ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy (UPS) refers to the measurement of kinetic energy spectra of photoelectrons emitted by molecules which have absorbed ultraviolet photons, in order to determine molecular orbital energies in the valence region. If Einstein's photoelectric law is applied to a free molecule, the kinetic energy (formula_1) of an emitted photoelectron is given by where "h" is Planck's constant, ν is the frequency of the ionizing light, and I is an ionization energy for the formation