TY - JOUR
T1 - Soft Crystals in Flatland
T2 - Unraveling Epitaxial Growth
AU - Ward, Michael D.
N1 - Funding Information:
The author gratefully acknowledges support from the MRSEC Program of the National Science Foundation under Award Number DMR-1420073.
PY - 2016/7/26
Y1 - 2016/7/26
N2 - Thin film epitaxy typically invokes a superposition of a pair of rigid two-dimensional lattices with a well-defined orientation governed by some form of commensurism. A report by Meissner et al. in this issue of ACS Nano demonstrates that the organization of organic molecules on substrates may not be that simple, as static distortion waves involving miniscule shifts of atomic positions from substrate lattice points can lead to orientations of a molecular film that cannot be described by often used models. Herein, we provide some highlights of epitaxy, with a focus on configurations that reflect the delicate balance between intermolecular interactions within a molecular film and molecule-substrate interactions. Although geometric models for explaining and predicting epitaxial configurations can be used to guide synthesis of materials, their use must recognize energetic factors and the possibility of more complex, and possibly less predictable, interface structures.
AB - Thin film epitaxy typically invokes a superposition of a pair of rigid two-dimensional lattices with a well-defined orientation governed by some form of commensurism. A report by Meissner et al. in this issue of ACS Nano demonstrates that the organization of organic molecules on substrates may not be that simple, as static distortion waves involving miniscule shifts of atomic positions from substrate lattice points can lead to orientations of a molecular film that cannot be described by often used models. Herein, we provide some highlights of epitaxy, with a focus on configurations that reflect the delicate balance between intermolecular interactions within a molecular film and molecule-substrate interactions. Although geometric models for explaining and predicting epitaxial configurations can be used to guide synthesis of materials, their use must recognize energetic factors and the possibility of more complex, and possibly less predictable, interface structures.
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U2 - 10.1021/acsnano.6b03830
DO - 10.1021/acsnano.6b03830
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:84979939242
SN - 1936-0851
VL - 10
SP - 6424
EP - 6428
JO - ACS nano
JF - ACS nano
IS - 7
ER -