It is important to note that these fluorescent lines are
actually observed as peaks with a semi-Gaussian distribution because
of the imperfect resolution of modern detector technology.
Therefore, by determining the energy of the X-ray peaks in
a sample’s spectrum, and by calculating the count rate of the various
elemental peaks, it is possible to qualitatively establish the elemental
composition of the samples and to quantitatively measure the
concentration of these elements.