Right, Chris.

There is a factor in the EXAFS equation, f(k). In different parts of the literature, f(k) sometimes has different meanings, but within the context of FEFF it refers to the effect of the potential of the scattering atom on both the scattering amplitude (the real part) and phase (the imaginary part).

Thus, it stands for "f effective."

My understanding, although I could be wrong is that the "effective" part came from an improvement of the theory to account for curved-wave effects. In other words, early theories approximated the photoelectron as a plane wave, but of course it spreads out radially from the absorbing atom. That change necessitated tweaking the definitions of the factors, so it became the "effective" f.

--Scott Calvin

Sarah Lawrence College