Submolecular resolution by variation of the inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy amplitude and its relation to the AFM/STM signal

0484818 - FZÚ 2018 RIV US eng J - Journal Article
De La Torre Cerdeño, Bruno - Švec, Martin - Foti, Giuseppe - Krejčí, Ondřej - Hapala, Prokop - Garcia-Lekue, A. - Frederiksen, T. - Zbořil, R. - Arnau, A. - Vázquez, Héctor - Jelínek, Pavel
Submolecular resolution by variation of the inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy amplitude and its relation to the AFM/STM signal.
Physical Review Letters. Roč. 119, č. 16 (2017), s. 1-6, č. článku 166001. ISSN 0031-9007. E-ISSN 1079-7114
R&D Projects: GA ČR GA15-19672S; GA ČR GJ17-24210Y
EU Projects: European Commission(XE) 709114 - HEATEXMOL
Grant - others:AV ČR(CZ) AP1601
Program: Akademická prémie - Praemium Academiae
Institutional support: RVO:68378271
Keywords : noncontact atomic force microscopy * first principles calculations * density functional theory * nonequilibrium Green's function * scanning probe microsco
OECD category: Condensed matter physics (including formerly solid state physics, supercond.)
Impact factor: 8.839, year: 2017

Here we show scanning tunneling microscopy (STM), noncontact atomic force microscopy (AFM), and inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy (IETS) measurements on an organic molecule with a CO-terminated tip at 5 K. The high-resolution contrast observed simultaneously in all channels unambiguously demonstrates the common imaging mechanism in STM/AFM/IETS, related to the lateral bending of the CO-functionalized tip. The IETS spectroscopy reveals that the submolecular contrast at 5 K consists of both renormalization of vibrational frequency and variation of the amplitude of the IETS signal. This finding is also corroborated by first principles simulations. We extend accordingly the probe-particle AFM/STM/IETS model to include these two main ingredients necessary to reproduce the high-resolution IETS contrast. We also employ the first principles simulations to get more insight into a different response of frustrated translation and rotational modes of the CO tip during imaging.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0279954