Structure and Bonding of Ethylene Oxide on Si(100)

In English The bonding configuration and electronic structure of ethylene oxide adsorbed on Si(100)-(2 x 1) is investigated with fully polarization resolved X-ray absorption spectroscopy as well as with core level and valence band photoemission spectroscopy. Ethylene oxide is found to adsorb via a ring-opening reaction, where the molecule forms a five-membered ring together with the silicon surface dimer atoms inserting between a carbon and the oxygen atom. In the resulting geometry, the molecule is tilted out of the surface plane.