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Surface and Step Conductivities on Si(111) Surfaces

Sven Just, Marcus Blab, Stefan Korte, Vasily Cherepanov, Helmut Soltner, and Bert Voigtländer
Phys. Rev. Lett. 115, 066801 – Published 3 August 2015
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Abstract

Four-point measurements using a multitip scanning tunneling microscope are carried out in order to determine surface and step conductivities on Si(111) surfaces. In a first step, distance-dependent four-point measurements in the linear configuration are used in combination with an analytical three-layer model for charge transport to disentangle the 2D surface conductivity from nonsurface contributions. A termination of the Si(111) surface with either Bi or H results in the two limiting cases of a pure 2D or 3D conductance, respectively. In order to further disentangle the surface conductivity of the step-free surface from the contribution due to atomic steps, a square four-probe configuration is applied as a function of the rotation angle. In total, this combined approach leads to an atomic step conductivity of σstep=(29±9)Ω1m1 and to a step-free surface conductivity of σsurf=(9±2)×106Ω1/ for the Si(111)(7×7) surface.

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  • Received 9 February 2015

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.115.066801

This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Sven Just1, Marcus Blab1, Stefan Korte1, Vasily Cherepanov1, Helmut Soltner2, and Bert Voigtländer1,*

  • 1Peter Grünberg Institut (PGI-3) and JARA-Fundamentals of Future Information Technology, Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany
  • 2Central Institute of Engineering, Electronics and Analytics (ZEA-1), Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany

  • *Corresponding author. b.voigtlaender@fz-juelich.de

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Vol. 115, Iss. 6 — 7 August 2015

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