Dimer Coupling Energies of the Si(001) Surface

Abstract

The coupling energies between the buckled dimers of the Si(001) surface were determined through analysis of the anisotropic critical behavior of its order-disorder phase transition. Spot profiles in high-resolution low-energy electron diffraction as a function of temperature were analyzed within the framework of the anisotropic two-dimensional Ising model. The validity of this approach is justified by the large ratio of correlation lengths, ${\xi }_{\parallel }^{+}/{\xi }_{\perp }^{+}=5.2$ of the fluctuating $c(4\times 2)$ domains above the critical temperature $T_{\mathrm{c}}=(190.6\pm 10)$ K. We obtain effective couplings $J_{\parallel }=(-24.9\pm 1.3)$ meV along the dimer rows and $J_{\perp }=(-0.8\pm 0.1)$ meV across the dimer rows, i.e., antiferromagnetic-like coupling of the dimers with $c(4\times 2)$ symmetry.

Accepted for publication at Physical Review Letters on 02Feb23