Preparation of layered thin film samples for angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy
- Department of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305 (United States)
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Advanced Light Source, Berkeley, California 94720 (United States)
- IBM Almaden Research Center, 650 Harry Road, San Jose, California 95120 (United States)
- Clarendon Laboratory, Department of Physics, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3PU (United Kingdom)
Materials with layered van der Waals crystal structures are exciting research topics in condensed matter physics and materials science due to outstanding physical properties associated with their strong two dimensional nature. Prominent examples include bismuth tritelluride and triselenide topological insulators (TIs), which are characterized by a bulk bandgap and pairwise counter-propagating spin-polarized electronic surface states. Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) of ex-situ grown thin film samples has been limited by the lack of suitable surface preparation techniques. We demonstrate the shortcomings of previously successful conventional surface preparation techniques when applied to ternary TI systems which are susceptible to severe oxidation. We show that in-situ cleaving is a simple and effective technique for preparation of clean surfaces on ex-situ grown thin films for high quality ARPES measurements. The method presented here is universally applicable to other layered van der Waals systems as well.
- OSTI ID:
- 22350745
- Journal Information:
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 105, Issue 12; Other Information: (c) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0003-6951
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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