Question

An x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis is performed on a sample and peaks were detected at kinetic energies of 690, 720, 910 and 920 eV along with an Auger peak at 330 eV. Using the binding energies and characteristic x-ray tables of elements determine which material is used as the x-ray source and which material is the sample being characterized

Answer 1

Given that the peaks that detected at kinetic energies of 690, 720, 910 and 920 eV along with an Auger peak at 330 eV.
Now since the photon energy is known we can transform the spectrum such that the horizontal axix will be Binding energy.
Doing this it is observed that intense peak will be seen occuring at binding energy corresponding to 335eV a sketch of it is shown below.

This result is identical when x-ray source consists Mg Kα radiation at energy( hν) = 1253.6 eV
The material that is being charaterized is therfore Pd metal by comparing the peaks with standard data by the technique of  X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy.