Conduction mechanism in ultrathin metallic films

Abstract

The conduction mechanism in ultrathin films may differ from bulk materials due to different effects: surface scattering and quantum size effect should be considered. Also weak localization and superconductivity may be important. All those effects are detected with the magnetoconductance. Therefore epitaxial Pb films have been grown on Si(111) $7\times 7$ in ultrahigh vacuum at low temperatures. With conductance and magnetoconductance in situ those contributions are separated. Due to detailed structural informations from spot profile analysis of low-energy electron diffraction the effect of film disorder and surface roughness is revealed for all scattering processes.