Publication

Probing hot-electron dynamics at surfaces with a cold scanning tunneling microscope

Klaus Kern, Harald Brune
1999
Journal Articles

Abstract

We report on a novel approach to measure the phase relaxation length and femtosecond lifetime of hot quasiparticles on metal surfaces. A 4 K scanning tunneling microscope has been used to study the spatial decay of interference patterns in the local density of states for surface state electrons on Ag(111) and Cu(111). This decay is governed by inelastic; electron-electron scattering. We find a (E - E-F)(-2) energy dependence of the lifetimes for both Ag and Cu, and our values are comparable to the corresponding bulk electron lifetimes. This indicates that electron-electron interaction of hot surface state electrons with the Fermi sea is dominated by the underlying bulk electrons. [S0031-9007(99)09260-1].

Official source

https://infoscience.epfl.ch/entities/publication/bf3d2bb1-fa7a-4c9e-a108-29227bbbde4e

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Klaus Kern, Harald Brune
1999
Journal Articles

Abstract

Official source

https://infoscience.epfl.ch/entities/publication/bf3d2bb1-fa7a-4c9e-a108-29227bbbde4e

About this result

Related concepts (32)

Scanning electron microscope

A scanning electron microscope (SEM) is a type of electron microscope that produces images of a sample by scanning the surface with a focused beam of electrons. The electrons interact with atoms in the sample, producing various signals that contain information about the surface topography and composition of the sample. The electron beam is scanned in a raster scan pattern, and the position of the beam is combined with the intensity of the detected signal to produce an image.

Electron microscope

An electron microscope is a microscope that uses a beam of electrons as a source of illumination. They use electron optics that are analogous to the glass lenses of an optical light microscope. As the wavelength of an electron can be up to 100,000 times shorter than that of visible light, electron microscopes have a higher resolution of about 0.1 nm, which compares to about 200 nm for light microscopes.

Electron diffraction

Electron diffraction refers to changes in the direction of electron beams due to interactions with atoms. Close to the atoms the changes are described as Fresnel diffraction; far away they are called Fraunhofer diffraction. The resulting map of the directions of the electrons far from the sample (Fraunhofer diffraction) is called a diffraction pattern, see for instance Figure 1. These patterns are similar to x-ray and neutron diffraction patterns, and are used to study the atomic structure of gases, liquids, surfaces and bulk solids.

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Probing hot-electron dynamics at surfaces with a cold scanning tunneling microscope

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