The Auger Effect in Germanium

Abstract

Auger electrons ejected from the $L$ and $M$ levels of germanium are studied by means of a magnetic spectrograph in which the ordinary photographic plate is replaced by a small Geiger-Müller electron counter. The maximum energy of the Auger electrons arising from the $K-L^2$ transition is found to be 8590±15 volts. The kinetic energies of ejected Auger electrons are computed from theoretical considerations and shown to agree well with those observed. An attempt is made to separate the band of electrons from the $L$ shell into three groups and compare their intensities with theory, but is not entirely reliable because of too low resolving power of the spectrograph. A reliable estimate of the relative probability of transitions $K\to L^2$ and $K\to \mathrm{LM}$ is made and found to be 100: 31, which is to be compared with 100: 58 calculated from the theory.