Discovery of an energy-dependent many-body process in the K β spectrum of manganese metal using extended-range high-energy-resolution fluorescence detection with advanced structural insights from principal component analysis

The discovery of the novel n = 2 satellite transition in the K β emission spectrum of manganese and its evolution with incident photon energy are presented. Using the XR-HERFD (extended-range high-energy-resolution fluorescence detection) technique, we conclusively demonstrate the existence of this phenomenon with a statistical significance corresponding to 652 σ _se across the measured spectrum, far above the discovery threshold of 3–6 σ _se . We apply principal component analysis (PCA) to the XR-HERFD data to extract advanced structural insights. The evolution of this novel spectral feature and physical process are quantified by incorporating regression, revealing the increase in intensity over a wide range of incident photon energies. We validate these findings through independent test data. These results directly challenge the conventional treatment of the many-body reduction factor S ₀ ² as a constant independent of incident photon energy in the standard XAFS (X-ray absorption fine structure) equation. Thereby, these results present compelling evidence that S ₀ ² should be modelled as a varying function of incident photon energy, marking the first observation of this behaviour in K β spectra. This facilitates a greater quantitative understanding of HERFD spectra and a comprehensive representation of many-body effects in condensed matter systems.