cm071054b_si_001.pdf (17.48 kB)
Molecules Coining Patterns into a Metal: The Hard Core of Soft Matter
journal contribution
posted on 2007-08-21, 00:00 authored by Gregor Witte, Katrin Hänel, Carsten Busse, Alexander Birkner, Christof WöllUsing scanning tunneling microscopy (STM), we demonstrate that deposition of a monolayer of perylene
(C20H12), a planar aromatic molecule, on a Cu(110) substrate leads to the formation of a periodic pattern
of nanostripes. High-resolution STM data indicate that the driving force for this unexpected surface
restructuring caused by such nonreactive hydrocarbons is a lock-in mechanism due to a close registry of
the molecular carbon frame with respect to the underlying copper lattice which leads to an enhanced
adsorption energy.