This supplement of Mikrochimica Acta contains selected papers from the Second Workshop of the European Microbeam Analysis Society (EMAS) on "Modern Developments and Applications in Microbeam Analysis", which took place in May 1991 in Dubrovnik (Yugoslavia).

For this meeting, EMAS chose to highlight the following topics: electron-beam microanalysis (EPMA) of thin films and quantitative analysis of ultra-light elements, Auger electron spectroscopy (AES), electron energy loss spectrometry (EELS), high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), quantitative analysis of biological samples and standard-less electron-beam microanalysis.

Seven introductory lectures and almost seventy poster presentations were given by speakers from twelve European and two non-European (U.S.A. and Argentina) countries were made. One cannot assume that all fields of research in Europe were duly represented, but a definite trend is discernible. EPMA with wavelength-dispersive spectrometry (WDS) or energy-dispersive spectrometry (EDS) is the method with by far the widest range of applications, followed by TEM with EELS and then AES. There are also interesting suggestions for the further development of new apparatus with new fields of application. Applications are heavily biased towards materials science (thin films in microelectronics and semiconductors), ceramics and metallurgy, followed by analysis of biological and mineral samples.

This issue contains the full texts of five introductory lectures and 25 brief articles. Sixteen contributions relate to the refinement of methods and procedures and nine of these are concerned with important applications in various fields. All submissions have been refereed according to the usual procedures. At the end of this issue is an overview of all the published work. We hope that these contributions to the field of electron microbeam analysis will be found to be useful.

Quantitative EPMA of the ultra-light elements boron through oxygen. G.F. Bastin and H.J.M. Heijligers 19

Auger microscopy and electron probe microanalysis. J. Cazaux 37

Quantitative X-ray microanalysis of ultra-thin resin-embedded samples. H.Y. Elder, S.M. Wilson, W.A.P. Nicholson, J.D. Pediani, S.A. McWilliams, D. McEwan Jenkinson and Ch.J. Kenyon 53

Analytical and high-resolution electron microscopy studies at metal/ceramic interfaces. M. Rühle 75

Quantitative electron probe microanalysis of multilayer structures. G.F. Bastin, J.M. Dijkstra, H.J.M. Heijligers and D. Klepper 93

Comparison of (frZ) curve models in EPMA. J.A. Riveros, G.E. Castellano and J.C. Trincavelli 99

Quantitative electron probe microanalysis: new accurate (frZ) description. C. Merlet 107

A modular universal correction procedure for quantitative EPMA. I. Farthing, G. Love, V.D. Scott and C.T. Walker 117

Monte Carlo simulation of backscattered and secondary electron profiles. Ch. Eisenschmidt and U. Werner 125

An electron scattering model applied to the determination of film thicknesses using electron probe microanalysis. H.-J. August 131

Calculation of depth distribution functions for characteristic and for continuous radiation. H.-J. August 139

A method for in-situ calibration of semiconductor detectors. J. Wernisch, A. Schönthaler and H.-J. August 147

Background anomalies in electron probe microanalysis caused by total reflection. W.P. Rehbach and P. Karduck 153

Automatic analysis of soft X-ray emission spectra obtained by EPMA. I.A. Slavic, J.I. Slavic, I.A. Grzetic and M.K. Pavicevic 161

The scanning very-low-energy electron microscope (SVLEEM). I. Müllerová and M. Lenc 173

To the backscattering contrast in scanning auger microscopy. L. Frank 179

Design considerations regarding the use of an accelerator mass spectrometer in ion microanalysis. K.M. Subotic and M.K. Pavicevic 187

Accurate estimation of uncertainties in quantitative electron energy-loss spectroscopy J.J.Y. van Puymbroeck, W.A. Jacob and P.J.M. Van Espen 191

An EELS system for a TEM/STEM-performance and its use in materials science. R. Schneider and W. Rechner 197

Quantitative X-ray microanalysis of bio-organic bulk specimens. A. Boekestein 205

Quantitative analysis of (Y2O3)_x(ZrO2)_1-x films on silicon by EPMA. N. Ammann, A. Lubig and P. Karduck 213

EPMA on surface oxide films. P. Willich and K. Schiffmann 221

Non-destructive determination of ion-implanted impurity distribution in silicon by EPMA. A.P. Alexeyev 229

An electron spectroscopy study of a-SiN_x films. A.G. Fitzgerald, H.L.L. Watton and M.J. Rose 235

Electron probe microanalysis of glass fibre optics. M. Kern, E. Perman and P. Pavli 241

Quantitative microanalysis of low concentrations of carbon in steels. J. Ruste 247

Electron configuration of the valence-conduction band of the mineral wustite. D.M. Timotijevic and M.K. Pavicevic 255

Structural analysis of silver halide cubic micro crystals with epitaxial or conversion growths by STEM-EDX. S. Wu, A. Van Daele, W. Jacob, R. Gijbels, A. Verbeeck and R. De Keyzer 261