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The dynamics of benzene on Cu(111): a combined helium spin echo and dispersion-corrected DFT study into the diffusion of physisorbed aromatics on metal surfaces

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

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Authors

Sacchi, M 
Singh, P 
Chisnall, DM 
Ward, DJ 
Jardine, AP 

Abstract

We use helium spin-echo spectroscopy (HeSE) to investigate the dynamics of the diffusion of benzene adsorbed on Cu(111). The results of these measurements show that benzene moves on the surface through an activated jump-diffusion process between the adsorption sites on a Bravais lattice. Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculations with van der Waals (vdW) corrections help us understand that the molecule diffuses by jumping through non-degenerate hollow sites. The results of the calculations shed light on the nature of the binding interaction between this prototypical aromatic molecule and the metallic surface. The highly accurate HeSE experimental data provide a quantitatively stringent benchmark for the vdW correction schemes applied to the DFT calculations and we compare the performances of several dispersion interaction schemes.

Description

Keywords

0306 Physical Chemistry (incl. Structural)

Journal Title

Faraday Discussions

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

1359-6640
1364-5498

Volume Title

Publisher

Royal Society of Chemistry
Sponsorship
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/E004962/1)
MS would like to thank the Royal Society for his University Research Fellowship. HH acknowledges the support of the Leverhulme Trust. This work used the ARCHER UK National Supercomputing Service via our membership of the UK’s HEC Materials Chemistry Consortium, which is funded by EPSRC (EP/L000202).