Widespread erroneous analysis of the Fe 2p peak in X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy examination in corrosion studies

XPS analysis is routinely used in corrosion studies to analyse corrosion product and protective layers on a range of metals. In the case of transition metals and especially iron, the extraction of information about chemical species including identification and quantification requires complex fitting of the metal 2p spectrum. Unfortunately, there is extensive misunderstanding of what is required for fitting of these metal 2p photoelectron peaks. In the case of high spin Fe 2p compounds there is a complex structure based on multiplet and satellite peaks which is often ignored. In this review of the application of XPS in the study of corrosion and protection of ferrous metals; we quantify the extent of misinterpretation of XPS Fe 2p spectra within the literature. It is found that in over 70% of papers there is an adamant misunderstanding of the requirements for fitting Fe 2p, which can be divided into three groups. First, in the most serious case, there seems to be a lack of understanding of spin orbit coupling which gives rise to the major Fe 2p 3/2 and Fe 2p 1/2 peaks with the latter being incorrectly assigned to a different chemical species. Second, satellite structures are often assigned to a different chemical species. Third, single peaks are used to fit chemical components whereas a complex multiplet structure should be employed. We establish the extent to which these errors are made by critical appraisal of over 220 papers published in selected years between 2015 and 2024.