Influence of energy loss function to the Monte Carlo simulated electron backscattering coefficient

Abstract

Abstract We report an improved calculation of the electron backscattering coefficients (BSCs) for beryllium, molybdenum and tungsten at electron energies of 0.1–100 keV based on an up-to-date Monte Carlo simulation method with different input of energy loss function (ELF) data. The electron inelastic cross-section is derived from the relativistic dielectric functional formalism, where the full Penn’s algorithm is applied for the extension of the ELF from the optical limit of $$q \to 0$$ q → 0 into the $$\left( {q,\omega } \right)$$ q , ω -plane. We have found that the accuracy of energy loss function may affect largely the calculated BSC. We also show that this has close relationship with the f- and ps-sum rules.