AVS 45th International Symposium
    Surface Science Division Wednesday Sessions
       Session SS3-WeM

Paper SS3-WeM3
Surface Morphology Induced on Metal Surfaces by Ion Sputtering

Wednesday, November 4, 1998, 9:00 am, Room 314/315

Session: Surface Dynamics and Roughening
Presenter: U. Valbusa, University of Genova, Italy
Authors: S. Rusponi, University of Genova, Italy
G. Costantini, University of Genova, Italy
C. Boragno, University of Genova, Italy
U. Valbusa, University of Genova, Italy
Correspondent: Click to Email
Ion sputtering can be used not only to clean or to analyse a surface, but also to construct regular patterns on amorphous, semiconductor and metals surfaces. We studied the formation of these patterns in different metal single crystals by using a variable temperature UHV STM. By accurately dosing the ion energy, flux and fluence and by selecting the appropriate crystal temperature, we can tune the final morphology, changing the shape of holes and islands, their density and thickness. Different examples will be reported: on Ag(110)@footnote 1@ and Cu(110)@footnote 2@ a ripple structure can be induced, with an orientation respect to the surface directions depending mainly on the temperature, while on Ag(001)@footnote 3@ a checkerboard morphology with a square simmetry has been found. It has been found that many properties of the sputtered surfaces follow simple scaling laws. A general model, based on the competitive role of surface diffusion and erosion can well explain the reported results. @FootnoteText@ @footnote 1@S. Rusponi et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 78 (1997) 2795 @footnote 2@S. Rusponi et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., submitted @footnote 3@S. Rusponi et al., Surf. Sci., submitted