Easily realized inelastic electron tunneling spectrometer

An easily realized inelastic electron tunneling spectrometer (IETS) controlled by computer through an IEEE-488 interface bus is described. Components and circuits of the system are described in detail in order to help newcomers to IETS build a research quality spectrometer on a relatively low budget. The system design is much simpler and easier to implement than others reported in the literature, and experimental results indicate that the spectrometer has comparable resolution and signal-to-noise ratio. Additionally, in-house software routines offer the system considerable flexibility in spectral data manipulation, for example, background correction, numerical differentiation, and subtraction of one spectrum from another may be performed.