Kondo resonance line-shape of magnetic adatoms on decoupling layers

Rok Zitko

Published 2011-10-20, updated 2011-10-24Version 2

The zero-bias resonance in the dI/dV tunneling spectrum recorded using a scanning tunneling microscope above a spin-1/2 magnetic adatom (such as Ti) adsorbed on a decoupling layer on metal surface can be accurately fitted using the universal spectral function of the Kondo impurity model both at zero field and at finite external magnetic field. Excellent agreement is found both for the asymptotic low-energy part and for the high-energy logarithmic tails of the Kondo resonance. For finite magnetic field, the nonlinear fitting procedure consists in repeatedly solving the impurity model for different Zeeman energies in order to obtain accurate spectral functions which are compared with the experimental dI/dV curves. The experimental results at zero field are sufficiently restraining to enable an unprecedented reliability in the determination of the Kondo temperature, while at finite fields the results are more ambiguous and two different interpretations are proposed.