Experimental Evidence for a Structure-Induced Minimum of the Density of States at the Fermi Energy in Amorphous Alloys

First photoemission spectra are reported for the valence bands and core levels of quench-condensed AuₓSn_100-x ($0<~x<~100$) films in the amorphous and the crystalline state. It is found that (1) the valence-band spectra for the $20<~x<~80$ region, measured just after condensation, exhibit a decrease in intensity towards the Fermi energy EF which can be understood in terms of a minimum in the density of states near EF and (2) the minimum near EF is most pronounced at an alloy concentration where the highest stability for the amorphous phase has been found.