Quantitative treatment for extracting coherent elastic scattering from X-ray scattering experiments

A fitting procedure for separating the inelastic and elastic contributions to the total scattering in diffuse-scattering experiments at high energy using energy-dispersive X-ray techniques is presented. An asymmetric peak function is used to model the elastic peak. The inelastic scattering peak is modeled using a theoretical Compton profile, calculated using the impulse approximation (Hartree-Fock wave functions were used), convoluted with the detector resolution. This procedure, which requires only two free parameters, is shown to be extremely effective in extracting the integrated elastic intensity of coherent scattering at each wave vector, even at low scattering angles where the Compton scattering is not well resolved.