Experimental Compton Profile of Iron

The Compton profile of polycrystalline iron has been measured using 59.54-keV $\gamma$ rays from an ${}_{}{}^{241}{}_{}{}^{}\mathrm{Am}$ source. In the regions of medium and high electron momentum, the observed profile is in good agreement with a free atom $3d^{7}4s$ configuration. At small momenta the experimental results deviate significantly from those predicted by free-atom or free-electron model. These findings are analogous to earlier results on vanadium and titanium but are in contrast with recent Mo- and $\mathrm{Ag}-K\alpha$ x-ray measurements on iron by Phillips and Weiss.