Communication

A Quantum-Stabilized Mirror for Atoms†

  1. Daniel Barredo2,
  2. Fabian Calleja2,
  3. Pablo Nieto2,
  4. Juan José Hinarejos2,
  5. Guillame Laurent2,
  6. Amadeo L. Vázquez de Parga2,3,*,
  7. Daniel Farías2,
  8. Rodolfo Miranda1,2

Article first published online: 5 AUG 2008

DOI: 10.1002/adma.200800866

Issue

Advanced Materials

Advanced Materials

Volume 20, Issue 18, pages 3492–3497, September 17, 2008

Additional Information

How to Cite

Barredo, D., Calleja, F., Nieto, P., Hinarejos, J. J., Laurent, G., de Parga, A. L. V., Farías, D. and Miranda, R. (2008), A Quantum-Stabilized Mirror for Atoms. Adv. Mater., 20: 3492–3497. doi: 10.1002/adma.200800866

Author Information

  1. 1

    Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados en Nanociencia (IMDEA-Nanociencia) Cantoblanco, 28049 Madrid (Spain)

  2. 2

    Departamento de Física de la Materia Condensada and Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales “Nicolás Cabrera” Universidad Autónoma de Madrid Cantoblanco, 28049 Madrid (Spain)

  3. 3

    Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados en Nanociencia (IMDEA-Nanociencia) Facultad de Ciencias, Módulo C-IX-3a Planta Cantoblanco 28049, Madrid (Spain)

*Departamento de Física de la Materia Condensada and Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales “Nicolás Cabrera” Universidad Autónoma de Madrid Cantoblanco, 28049 Madrid (Spain).

  1. †

    We thank D. A. MacLaren for many useful discussions and B. Prost (ITME) for the ultraperfect Si(111) wafers. This work was supported by the Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia through projects FIS2007- 61114 and CONSOLIDER CSD-2007-00010, Comunidad de Madrid through project Nanomagnet S0505-MAT0194, and the European Union through the NEST-STREP project no. 509014, and by the Programa Ramón y Cajal (D.F.).

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 5 SEP 2008
  2. Article first published online: 5 AUG 2008
  3. Manuscript Revised: 26 MAY 2008
  4. Manuscript Received: 28 MAR 2008

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Keywords:

  • molecular beams;
  • epitaxy;
  • quantum effects;
  • scanning tunneling microscopy;
  • surface structure
Thumbnail image of graphical abstract

“The smoothest surface ever made”, that is, a mirror for atoms comprising a Pb thin film on Si(111), is stabilized through quantum size effects to be atomically flat. It shows an absolute reflectivity for He atoms of 15%, and we report on how values close to 40% could be obtained. This highly reflective mirror can also be electrostatically bent to focus the He beam into a sub-micrometer spot. This implies that current prototype scanning helium atom microscopy/diffractometry instruments could easily reach nanometer resolution.

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