Au Adatoms in Self-Assembly of Benzenethiol on the Au(111) Surface

Self-assembly of benzenethiol at low coverage on Au(111) was studied using low-temperature scanning tunneling microscopy. Phenylthiolate species (PhS), formed by thermal dehydrogenation of the parent PhSH molecule, was found to self-assemble into surface-bonded complexes with gold adatoms. Each comp...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of the American Chemical Society 2008-06, Vol.130 (24), p.7518-7519
Main Authors: Maksymovych, Peter, Yates, John T
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:Self-assembly of benzenethiol at low coverage on Au(111) was studied using low-temperature scanning tunneling microscopy. Phenylthiolate species (PhS), formed by thermal dehydrogenation of the parent PhSH molecule, was found to self-assemble into surface-bonded complexes with gold adatoms. Each complex involves two PhS species and one gold adatom. The PhS species form either cis- or trans-geometry relative to each other. At a higher coverage, the complexes coalesce, most likely due to the formation of weak C−H···S hydrogen bonds facilitated by the spatial arrangement of the PhS groups. Our findings thus establish that the self-assembly of arenethiols on the Au(111) surface is driven by gold adatom chemistry, which has recently been found to be the key ingredient in the self-assembly of alkanethiols on gold.
ISSN:0002-7863
1520-5126
DOI:10.1021/ja800577w