Pursuit of Surface Topography

The literature described dates basically from the period January 1976 to March 1979 but in no way is the coverage considered to be exhaustive. 

An electron reflected from a surface carries diffraction information if it has experienced elastic scattering or information on the excitation of phonons, plasmons, and electronic or vibrational transitions as the result of inelastic events. The major effort in diffraction studies has concentrated on the use of low energies ( 200 eV) but reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED 20—40keV) is suitable also for surface work (see ref. 2 for a description of pattern interpretation). RHEED 

Inelastic effects are exploited in the rapidly developing technique of high resolution electron energy loss spectroscopy (ELS or EELS) which permits identification of adsorbed molecules or molecular fragments by their vibrational spectra. Thus the method has much in common with the infrared spectroscopy of surfaces and, not surprisingly, the classic case of CO adsorption has received attention on Ni(lOO) and on stepped Ni and Pt surfaces. Other recent investigations of interest include H2 on organic species on Ni and Pt, and the observation of 

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