Photoelectron diffraction study on the structure of a vanadium ultrathin film deposited at the TiO2(110) surface

This Letter reports an X-ray photoelectron diffraction study of ∼5 V monolayers deposited by electron beam evaporation at the TiO 2 (110) surface. Data clearly show that V grows as islands with a bcc structure having the [100] direction normal to the substrate surface. A detailed analysis of the V″2p and Ti″3p azimuthal curves indicates also an alignment of the [001] overlayer azimuth with the [1¯10] direction of the TiO 2 substrate. These results are consistent with an epitaxial growth of bcc V at the TiO 2 (110) surface where a double V surface unit cell is matched to the TiO 2 (110) rectangular cell.