Structural model of quasiperiodic Pb monolayer deposited on fivefold i-Al-Pd-Mn surface

Abstract

On the basis of analysis of experimental STM images and ab-initio calculations we propose a structural model of the quasiperiodic Pb monolayer grown on the fivefold i-Al-Pd-Mn surface at a coverage close to the saturation. The skeleton of the Pb monolayer can be seen as a network of the "star-fish" (SF) clusters. The atomic structure of the monolayer is based on a decorated P1 tiling. The model can reproduce also the experimentally observed quasiperiodic τ-scaled P1 ordering (τ is the golden mean). The bright spots seen in STM images appear at Pb atoms in the centers of those SF clusters where the substrate has Al atoms at these positions. © 2010 IOP Publishing Ltd.