Growth of Tb(0 0 0 1) on Nb and Mo(1 1 0) surfaces

We study the growth of Tb(0 0 0 1) on Nb(1 1 0) and Mo(1 1 0) under UHV conditions by laser ablation. For this purpose we perform first chemical and structural characterisation of the annealed and as-grown Mo and Nb buffer layers prepared on sapphire (1 1 −2 0). In a second step we investigate the growth modes of Tb(0 0 0 1) at coverages ranging from 0.5 to 4 monolayers on these surfaces in the moderate and high temperature regime (200–700 °C). The methods employed are in situ scanning tunneling microscopy, Auger spectroscopy and reflection high-energy electron diffraction and ex situ X-ray diffraction. We discuss the results taking into account the structure of the buffer layers.