From microchips to moon rocks—how the world depends on counting atoms
Wednesday, December 23, 2015 - 10:58
in Physics & Chemistry
What do ancient artefacts, fragments from celestial bodies, microchips and gunshot residue have in common? Their innermost secrets can all be unveiled with the same method. Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (RBS) uses a beam of charged particles to analyse their composition by counting the atoms in thin-film materials.