Herringbone ordering compressed monolayers

Figure 38. Striped domain wall in a model of uniaxially compressed N2 monolayers on graphite (a) observed in Monte Carlo simulations of 52 X 12 molecules at 10 K and a coverage of 1.026 monolayers. Dots denote the centers of the honeycomb hexagons of the graphite basal plane, and crosses mark the mean positions of the molecular centers of mass. The inset of (a) shows the herringbone order in the commensurate region at the left and right boundaries of (a). The center-of-mass distribution in the region of the domain wall of (a) sampled from the Monte Carlo trajectory is magnified in (b). (Adapted from Fig. 1 of Ref. 283.)...

The ( /3 X y/3)R30° in-plane (2 x 1) herringbone monolayer was found to be the most stable configuration for all types of modeling [298]. The uniform uniaxial incommensurate monolayer has also in-plane herringbone orientational order even up to higher compressions, and a search for a stable out-of-plane herringbone monolayer of the type shown in Fig. 4c led to no viable candidates. However, pinwheel stmcmres exist for certain potential... 

---