Issue 4, 2016

Reducing the V2O3(0001) surface through electron bombardment – a quantitative structure determination with I/V-LEED

Abstract

The (0001) surface of vanadium sesquioxide, V2O3, is terminated by vanadyl groups under standard ultra high vacuum preparation conditions. Reduction with electrons results in a chemically highly active surface with a well-defined LEED pattern indicating a high degree of order. In this work we report the first quantitative structure determination of a reduced V2O3(0001) surface. We identify two distinct surface phases by STM, one well ordered and one less well ordered. I/V-LEED shows the ordered phase to be terminated by a single vanadium atom per surface unit cell on a quasi-hexagonal oxygen layer with three atoms per two-dimensional unit cell. Furthermore we compare the method of surface reduction via electron bombardment with the deposition of V onto a vanadyl terminated film. The latter procedure was previously proposed to result in a structure with three surface vanadium atoms in the 2D unit cell and we confirm this with simulated STM images.

Graphical abstract: Reducing the V2O3(0001) surface through electron bombardment – a quantitative structure determination with I/V-LEED

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
30 Nov 2015
Accepted
22 Dec 2015
First published
22 Dec 2015
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2016,18, 3124-3130

Author version available

Reducing the V2O3(0001) surface through electron bombardment – a quantitative structure determination with I/V-LEED

F. E. Feiten, H. Kuhlenbeck and H. Freund, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2016, 18, 3124 DOI: 10.1039/C5CP07390A

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