Spin-orbit splitting of the L-gap surface state on Au(111) and Ag(111) -: art. no. 033407

We present high-resolution photoemission results on the L-gap surface state on Au(111) and Ag(111), in combination with fully relativistic density-functional calculations. In the case of Au(111), both experimental and theoretical results demonstrate that the lack of inversion symmetry at the surface leads to a considerable spin-orbit splitting of this surface state over the whole Fermi surface, whereas in the case of Ag(111) this splitting is far too small to be experimentally resolved in our data.