Transition from disorder to order in thin metallic films studied with angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy

Abstract

The transition from disorder to order in Ag film grown on Au(111) was investigated by monitoring the quantum well states using angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy. Our results show that the binding energies do not alter, but the in-plane dispersion alters from flat to parabolic when the film is annealed. We suggest that there are isolated and ordered patches scattered across the film at an early stage of the transition and that atoms inside the patches are fully ordered along the surface normal. These ordered patches grow and merge together as the annealing temperature increases.

Department

Physics

Publication Date

1-16-2008

Journal Title

Physical Review Letters

Publisher

AMERICAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

10.1103/PhysRevLett.100.027603

Document Type

Article

Rights

© 2008 The American Physical Society

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