Abstract
A thematic school, ASTER’X, is organized each year in Grenoble since 2021. This school focuses on training scientists using X-ray absorption techniques, X-ray emission spectroscopy, and X-ray imaging (tomography and ptychography), with lectures, tutorials and practicals. This handbook aims at gathering information needed during a XAS experiment, or to prepare it, starting by a general description of a XAS beamline and a check-list (do I have all the needed information at the end of my experiment?), followed by several sheets on the XAS subject.This handbook also gathers characteristic data of the elements in their pure state (such as the metallic state for most of the elements): absorption edge energies (or electron binding energies), natural width of these edges, X-ray fluorescence line energies, X-ray fluorescence line natural width.Several databases are available, scientists are still working on the subject to improve the precision of the values. We tried to compare the different values, not to determine which is the best one but to show the necessity to always cite which database is used.Finally, this handbook presents a compilation from the literature of the emission line shifts for the transition metals and a selection of XAS spectra of several model compounds.