Scanning Tunneling Microscopy—from Birth to Adolescence (Nobel Lecture)

The lectures delivered in Stockholm by last year's receivers of the Nobel prize for Physics are of great interest for chemists since both electron‐ and scanning‐tunneling microscopy are used in surface studies. The three laureates give colorful historical accounts of the development of their techniques without neglecting interesting human aspects—“some joyful events and many disappointments” (Ruska) . One of the first highlights of scanning tunneling microscopy was the elucidation of the 7 × 7 reconstruction of the Si(111) surface, see picture.