STM studies of 1-D noble metal growth on silicon

Our scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) studies show that noble metals (Ag, Au) Form a wide variety of I-D structures on the high-index Si(5 5 12) sur face. At coverages below 0.25 monolayer (ML), both metals grow as overlayer rows: with an inter-row spacing of similar to 5nm. At higher coverages and annealing temperatures, the underlying Si reconstruction is removed, but p eriodic row structures persist. Au can also induce faceting to nearby plane s, e.g. (7 7 15) and (2 2 5), at temperatures above 500 degreesC. For all c overages and annealing temperatures studied here (0.02-1 ML. 450-800 degree sC), the Si(5 5 12) template initiates I-D growth of the deposited noble me tals, (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.