Evidence of4fphotoemission satellites in cerium compounds

Experiments on CeP, CeAs, and CeBi have revealed two $4f$-derived photoemission features at binding energies of 0.6 eV [FWHM (full width at half maximum)∼0.7 eV] and 3.0-3.1 eV (FWHM ∼ 1.0 eV) due to competing Ce $4f$ photoionization channels. The relative intensity of the two spectral features changes by ∼ 10 from CeP to CeBi. These findings indicate strong $f-p$ hybridization and force a reevaluation of previous $4f$ binding energies in Ce compounds.