A high resolution photoemission study of surface core-level shifts in clean and oxygen-covered Ir(2 1 0) surfaces

High resolution soft X-ray photoemission electron spectroscopy (SXPS), using synchrotron radiation, is employed to investigate 4f core-level features of four differently-prepared Ir(2 1 0) surfaces: clean planar, oxygen-covered planar, oxygen-induced faceted, and clean faceted surfaces. Surface and bulk peak identifications are supported by measurements at different photon energies (thus probing different electron escape depths) and variable emission angles. Iridium 4f 7/2 photoemission spectra are fitted with Doniach–Sunjic lineshapes. The surface components are identified with core levels positioned at lower binding energies than the bulk components, in contrast to previous reports of binding energy inversion on Ir(1 0 0) (1×1) and (5×1) surfaces. For clean planar Ir(2 1 0) three surface Ir 4f 7/2 features are observed with core-level shifts of −765, −529, and −281 meV, with respect to the bulk; these are associated with the first, second and third layers of atoms, respectively, for atomically rough Ir(2 1 0). Adsorption of oxygen onto the planar Ir(2 1 0) surface is found to cause a suppression and shift of the surface features to higher binding energies. Annealing at T≥600 K in oxygen produces a faceted surface as verified by low energy electron diffraction (LEED). A comparison of planar and faceted oxygen-covered surfaces reveals minor differences in the normal emission SXPS spectra, while grazing emission spectra exhibit differences. The SXPS spectrum of the clean, faceted Ir(2 1 0) exhibits small differences in comparison to the clean planar case, with surface features having binding energy shifts of −710, −450, and −230 meV.