Project A04

A04 Controlling surface energy dissipation via tailored interface properties

The project undertakes a vigorous effort to study the energy conversion processes during atomic and molecular collisions with the surfaces of solids and how they exchange their translational, rotational and vibrational energy with solid-state degrees of freedom. Surface energy dissipation will be controlled by varying the solid-state degrees of freedom in two main model systems: (i) Graphene and other 2D systems modified by changing of the underlying substrate, doping or twisting and (ii) oxide heterostructures.



Project A04: Thickness-dependent Vibrational Survival probability of NO(v = 2) scattered from a tailored surface: here atomically controlled layers of Ag are formed on Au(111). The survival probability depends on the amount of Ag on the Au surface. The slope discontinuities in the survival probability coincide with the first and second monolayer closing. This is a direct sign that the work function, which also exhibits such slope discontinuities, is at the heart of the mechanism of vibrational relaxation