The epitaxial growth of Ag on Si(111)-(7 x 7) surface and its (√3x√3)-R30 surface phase transformation

Ag is adsorbed in ultra-high vacuum on to the (7x7) reconstructed Si(111) surface with submonolayer coverage control with a deposition rate of 3-3 x 10¹² atoms/cm²/sec. The initial stages of growth and intermediate equilibrium phase formation are determined by using low energy electron diffraction (LEED) and X-ray photoelectron diffraction (XPD) for structural information, and auger electron spectroscopy (AES) and electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS) for composition and interaction analyses. Room temperature (RT) adsorption results in the nearly epitaxial (1 x 1) surface phase growth in the simultaneous multi-layer growth mode. The quenching of the dangling bond states during adsorption is observed by monitoring thep-character of the Si LVV auger peak. For depositions carried out at high temperatures (HT), several plateaus in the auger uptake curve with the (√3 x √3)-R30° LEED structures are formed. It is observed that a minimum coverage of 0–33 monolayer (ML) is required for the formation of the (√3 x √3) phase and this phase causes the reappearance of thep-electron-related states that were quenched by 1.0 ML adsorption at RT. However the (√3 x √3) is observed for higher coverages (0.66 and 1.0 ML) also. The polar angle anisotropy of Si(2p) emission in XPD indicates the rearrangement of substrate Si atoms for the formation of the (√3 x √3) phase. The EELS data also shows relevant changes due to adsorption of Ag at RT and upon annealing. The results suggest the importance of controlled deposition parameters, the lack of which may have kept the determination of the nature and coverage of the (√3 x √3) surface phase unresolved in literature.