Study of the synthesis and modification of molecules on metals and metal oxides in UHV environment with the aim of improving the charge transport properties at the interface and/or enhancing the catalytic properties of the reaction products. The research activity is performed at Sincrotrone-Elettra in the OSMOS lab and ALOISA (https://www.elettra.eu/elettra-beamlines/aloisa.html) beamline.
RESEARCH LINES
RL1: Morphological and structural characterization of self assembled layers of organic molecules, namely polyconjugated and heteroaromatic compounds (oligomers, polyacenes, perylenes, porphyrins and their derivatives). Study of the charge transfer and molecular bonding to the substrate, the on-surface molecular modifications, as well as the chemical interactions and linking in hetero-molecular systems, both in 2D and 2D+1 architectures.
RL2: Synthesis of 2D frameworks on surfaces, using small molecular precursors, aimed at modifying the chemical and morphological properties of the substrate. The main goal is to build 2D templates with specific chemical properties, able to selectively anchor guest species via molecular recognition.
EQUIPMENT
The OSMOS laboratory for microscopy (joint project between CNR-IOM and Sincrotrone-Elettra) is composed of three interconnected experimental chambers, including i) variable temperature STM chamber (SPECS Aahrus), ii) sample preparation chamber equipped with LEED and quartz microbalance, iii) X-ray spectroscopy chamber equipped with an Al/Mg X-ray source PSP Tx-400 and a monochromatized Gamma Data VUV 5k source (He I, II), which are coupled to a Scienta R3000 (150mm) electron spectrometer with CCD detector, and a closed-circuit liquid He cryostat (11 K on sample) for in-situ XPS and angle-resolved UPS analysis.
The project takes advantage of direct access to the Synchrotron beamline ALOISA (Luca Floreano) for performing high resolution fast-photoemission, resonant photoemission and X-ray absorption spectroscopy (NEXAFS) at variable scattering and polarization geometries.
LEFT: bowl-shaped corannulene molecules are trapped inside an artificially created triangular hole (8 nm side) on Ag(111); the fading intensity of the molecules on the upper terrace originates from the decrease of residence time due to molecular mobility. RIGHT: the pathway to 2D boronic condensation on Au(111) of naphtalene boronic acid through intermediate precursor stages: paired monomers at 250 K, partially condensed paired dimers at 300 K, and fully condensed trimers at 350 K.
CONTACTS
Luca Floreano
CNR-IOM
floreano@iom.cnr.it
Andrea Goldoni
Elettra-Sincrotone, Trieste andrea.goldoni@elettra.eu
Last updated on: 05/22/2023 - 09:27
