DIRECT ATOMIC-STRUCTURE BY HOLOGRAPHIC DIFFUSE LEED

A multiple-energy phase-summing method is applied to diffuse low-energy electron diffraction intensity spectra to obtain three-dimensional images of surface atoms. In this demonstration, calculated DLEED intensity spectra from a multiple scattering method are directly inverted to produce high-fidelity 3D images of near-neighbor atoms measured from an adatom. No prior knowledge of adsorption site, bond length, bond angle, or type of atom is needed. The images are essentially free from artifacts and have a spatial resolution of approximately 1 angstrom when viewed along any cut-plane. These results demonstrate that holographic DLEED has the potential of being an accurate and direct structural tool for low-density disordered adsorption systems.