Premium
Photon emission experiments with the scanning tunnelling microscope
Author(s) -
Coombs J. H.,
Gimzewski J. K.,
Reihl B.,
Sass J. K.,
Schlittler R. R.
Publication year - 1988
Publication title -
journal of microscopy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.569
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1365-2818
pISSN - 0022-2720
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2818.1988.tb01393.x
Subject(s) - spectroscopy , photoelectric effect , inverse photoemission spectroscopy , photon , microscopy , optics , resolution (logic) , microscope , scanning tunneling microscope , materials science , atomic physics , physics , photoemission spectroscopy , x ray photoelectron spectroscopy , nuclear magnetic resonance , nanotechnology , quantum mechanics , artificial intelligence , computer science
SUMMARY We have detected the light emitted from an STM at both ultraviolet (9·5 eV) and optical (1–4 eV) energies. We show that this light contains spectroscopic information on the sample surface comparable to conventional inverse photoelectric spectroscopy, but with nearly atomic spatial resolution. At optical energies we found sufficiently high intensities to allow spatial imaging of the emission probability. We propose that the high quantum efficiency is due to resonance phenomena, and present fluorescence spectra of the emitted light that support this view. We believe that atomic resolution inverse photoemission microscopy and spectroscopy will provide an important new dimension to surface studies.