Franceschi, G., Heller, R., Schmid, M., Diebold, U., & Riva, M. (2023). Evolution of the surface atomic structure of multielement oxide films: curse or blessing? Nanoscale Advances, 5(24), 7009–7017. https://doi.org/10.1039/D3NA00847A
Atomically resolved scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) are used to gain atomic-scale insights into the heteroepitaxy of lanthanum–strontium manganite (LSMO, La1−xSrxMnO3−d, x z 0.2) on SrTiO3(110). LSMO is a perovskite oxide characterized by several composition-dependent surface reconstructions. The flexibility of the surface allows it to incorporate nonstoichiometries during growth, which causes the structure of the surface to evolve accordingly. This happens up to a critical point, where phase separation occurs, clusters rich in the excess cations form at the surface, and films show a rough morphology. To limit the nonstoichiometry introduced by non- optimal growth conditions, it proves useful to monitor the changes in surface atomic structures as a function of the PLD parameters and tune the latter accordingly.
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Project title:
Wasser auf Oxidoberflächen: Ein grundlegender Ansatz: 883395 (European Commission) Spezialforschungsbereich “Taming Complexity in Materials Modeling”: F 81 (FWF - Österr. Wissenschaftsfonds)
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Research Areas:
Materials Characterization: 30% Surfaces and Interfaces: 70%
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