Quantitative determination of atomic buckling of silicene by atomic force microscopy.
- Pawlak R Department of Physics, University of Basel, CH 4056 Basel, Switzerland; remy.pawlak@unibas.ch jcerda@icmm.csic.es.
- Drechsel C Department of Physics, University of Basel, CH 4056 Basel, Switzerland.
- D'Astolfo P Department of Physics, University of Basel, CH 4056 Basel, Switzerland.
- Kisiel M Department of Physics, University of Basel, CH 4056 Basel, Switzerland.
- Meyer E Department of Physics, University of Basel, CH 4056 Basel, Switzerland.
- Cerda JI Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid (ICMM), Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC), 28049 Madrid, Spain remy.pawlak@unibas.ch jcerda@icmm.csic.es.
- 2019-12-25
Published in:
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. - 2020
English
The atomic buckling in 2D "Xenes" (such as silicene) fosters a plethora of exotic electronic properties such as a quantum spin Hall effect and could be engineered by external strain. Quantifying the buckling magnitude with subangstrom precision is, however, challenging, since epitaxially grown 2D layers exhibit complex restructurings coexisting on the surface. Here, we characterize using low-temperature (5 K) atomic force microscopy (AFM) with CO-terminated tips assisted by density functional theory (DFT) the structure and local symmetry of each prototypical silicene phase on Ag(111) as well as extended defects. Using force spectroscopy, we directly quantify the atomic buckling of these phases within 0.1-Å precision, obtaining corrugations in the 0.8- to 1.1-Å range. The derived band structures further confirm the absence of Dirac cones in any of the silicene phases due to the strong Ag-Si hybridization. Our method paves the way for future atomic-scale analysis of the interplay between structural and electronic properties in other emerging 2D Xenes.
- Language
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- English
- Open access status
- bronze
- Identifiers
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- DOI 10.1073/pnas.1913489117
- PMID 31871150
- Persistent URL
- https://folia.unifr.ch/unifr/documents/17929
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