Continuum determination in spectroscopic data by means of topological concepts and Fourier filtering

A novel implementation of a convex hull minimization algorithm for the determination of the continuum in x-ray and γ-ray spectroscopic data is presented in this paper. The method is semi-automatic, performed in three successive steps and requires user intervention regarding the values of two parameters. The first controls the low pass filtering and the second the reduction of the estimated points which construct the background. On the other hand, it does not rely on an explicit mathematical model of the background or the signal (FWHM, lineshapes) and keeps the original spectrum data unaltered.