Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 February 2011
The principles of scanning tunneling microscopy and its application to study silicon surfaces are briefly reviewed. Scanning tunneling microscopy “topographs” contain both geometric information about the locations of atoms at the surface as well as about the charge densities of surface localized states. We describe procedures by which these two components can be distinguished so as to produce images of the surface electronic states with atomic resolution. This ability to spatially resolve the surface electronic structure provides new information to understand the local structure and nature of bonding, and in some cases can be used as a means to chemically image specific features of the surface.