Atom manipulation on an insulating surface at room temperature

Shigeki Kawai; Adam S Foster; Filippo Federici Canova; Hiroshi Onodera; Shin-ichi Kitamura; Ernst Meyer

doi:10.1038/ncomms5403

Atom manipulation on an insulating surface at room temperature

Nat Commun. 2014 Jul 15:5:4403. doi: 10.1038/ncomms5403.

Authors

Shigeki Kawai¹, Adam S Foster², Filippo Federici Canova³, Hiroshi Onodera⁴, Shin-ichi Kitamura⁴, Ernst Meyer⁵

Affiliations

¹ 1] Department of Physics, University of Basel, Klingelbergstrasse 82, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland [2] PRESTO, Japan Science and Technology Agency, 4-1-8 Honcho, Kawaguchi, Japan.
² COMP, Department of Applied Physics, Aalto University, PO Box 11100, FI-00076 Aalto, Finland.
³ 1] Department of Physics, Tampere University of Technology, PO Box 692, FI-33010 Tampere, Finland [2] Advanced Institute for Materials Research, Tohoku Univeristy, 2-1-1 Katahira, Sendai 980-8577, Japan.
⁴ JEOL Ltd., Musashino 3-1-2, Akishima 196-8554, Tokyo, Japan.
⁵ Department of Physics, University of Basel, Klingelbergstrasse 82, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland.

PMID: 25022312
DOI: 10.1038/ncomms5403

Abstract

Atomic manipulation enables us to fabricate a unique structure at the atomic scale. So far, many atomic manipulations have been reported on conductive surfaces, mainly at low temperature with scanning tunnelling microscopy, but atomic manipulation on an insulator at room temperature is still a long-standing challenge. Here we present a systematic atomic manipulation on an insulating surface by advanced atomic force microscopy, enabling construction of complex patterns such as a 'Swiss cross' of substitutional bromine ions in the sodium chloride surface.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't