Initial growth of Au on oxides

The growth of Au clusters on TiO2(110) - (1 x 1) and -(1 x 2) single-crystal surfaces and on ordered Al2O3 films prepared on Re(0001) has been studied by low-energy electron diffraction (LEED), Auger electron spectroscopy (AES), low-energy ion scattering spectroscopy (LEISS) and high-resolution electron energy-loss spectroscopy (HREELS). The results indicate that Au forms two-dimensional islands on the TiO2(110) surface at initial deposition of Au. On the alumina film, Au initially grows as three-dimensional clusters. The coverage of Au at which Au clusters change from non-metallic to metallic properties is found to be > 0.3 monolayer equivalent (MLE) of Au deposition based on the energy shift of the surface plasmon measurements. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.