Positive and Negative Contributions of XPS to Reproducibility Issues

Challenges associated with reproducibility and replication are impacting many areas of science. The reproducible preparation and delivery of nanoparticles is challenging and XPS can help address this problem. However, as the importance and use of XPS grown, there are increasing numbers of publications that include the inappropriate or incorrect use of XPS. Such papers add to reliability and reproducibility issues in the literature, sometimes leading to replication of errors and incorrect analyses. Some of the types of problems with “bad” XPS in publications are identified and the development of a series of guides and tutorials to help address the problem is described.