Bridging the Pressure Gap in Surface Science at the Atomic Level:H/Cu(110)

Abstract
The structural response of the Cu(110) surface to H2 gas pressures ranging from 1013 to 1 bar is studied using a novel high-pressure scanning tunneling microscope (HP-STM). We find that at H2 pressures larger than 2 mbar the Cu(110) surface reconstructs into the ( 1×2) “missing-row” structure. From a quantitative analysis of the pressure dependence of the surface reconstruction, we conclude that Cu(110) responds identically to hydrogen at ultrahigh vacuum conditions and at atmospheric pressures. From the HP-STM data, we extract refined values for the adsorption and desorption rate constants.