Scanning tunnelling microscopy is utilized to investigate the local bias voltage tunnelling dependent transformation between （2×1） and c（4×2） structures on Ge（001） surfaces, which is reversibly observed at room temperature and a critical bias voltage of -0.80 V. Similar transformation is also found on an epitaxial Ce islands but at a slightly different critical bias voltage of -1.00V. It is found that the interaction between the topmost atoms on the STM tip and the atoms of the dimers, and the pinning effect induced by Sb atoms, the nacancies or the epitaxial clusters, can drive the structural transformation at the critical bias voltage.
Different In/Ge（001） nanostructures have been obtained by annealing the samples at 320℃ with different coverages of In. Annealing a sample with a critical coverage of 2.1 monolayer of In, different In/Ge（001） nanostructures can be obtained at different temperatures. It is found that thermal annealing treatments first make In atoms form elongated Ge{103}-faceted In-clusters, which will grow wider and longer with increasing temperature, and finally cover the surface completely.
We report the formation and local electronic structure of Ge clusters on the Si（111）-7×7 surface studied by using variable temperature scanning tunnelling microscopy （VT-STM） and low-temperature scanning tunnelling spectroscopy （STS）. Atom-resolved STM images reveal that the Ce atoms are prone to forming clusters with 1.0 nm in diameter for coverage up to 0.12 ML. Such Ce clusters preferentially nucleate at the centre of the faulted-half unit cells, leading to the ＇dark sites＇ of Si centre adatoms from the surrounding three unfaulted-half unit cells in filled-state images. Biasdependent STM images show the charge transfer from the neighbouring Si adatoms to Ce clusters. Low-temperature STS of the Ce clusters reveals that there is a band gap on the Ce cluster and the large voltage threshold is about 0.9 V.
We report on the formation of a graphene monolayer on a Ru（0001） surface by annealing the Ru（0001） crystal. The samples are characterized by scanning tunnelling microscopy （STM） and Auger electron spectroscopy （AES）. STM images show that the Moire pattern is caused by the graphene layer mismatched with the underlying Ru（0001） surface and has an N × N superlattice. It is further found that the graphene monolayer on a Ru（0001） surface is very stable at high temperatures. Our results provide a simple and convenient method to produce a graphene monolayer on the Ru（0001） surface, which is used as a template for fabricating functional nanostructures needed in future nano devices and catalysis.
