Determination of plasma oscillations in metals using total external reflection of X-rays

A method to determine plasma oscillations in metals with the aid of total external reflection (TER) of X-rays is proposed. It is shown that the plasmon energy, concentration of conduction electrons, and Fermi energies can be calculated using experimentally measured grazing angles of X-rays after TER. Such characteristics depend on crystallographic directions and may depend on the TER depth.