Extraction of Information Contained in Scanning Tunneling Microscope Images

J. A. Meyer

Surface Science Letters 284, L416 (1993).

The scanning tunneling microscope (STM) is capable of recording the atomic positions of adsorbates on surfaces. This type of "microscopic" information is fundamentally different from "macroscopic" information (such as total coverage). Methods previously used for extracting interactions energies among adsorbates from STM images have relied on Monte Carlo simulations. Here a new technique is presented which does not require Monte Carlo simulations yet extracts the available information with maximal precision.