Molecular self-assembly on well-defined surfaces represents a promising technique, as it might
be able to unleash the potential for building devices at the nanoscale, by exploiting the
capabilities of molecular building blocks to autonomously organize in repeatable and periodic
structures.
The main focus of this thesis has been to study the self-assembly of trimesic acid on the
(111) surface plane of silver. The power of Scanning Tunneling Microscopy to image local
sub-nanoscale structures has made it the tool of choice for analysis.
Following the groundbreaking work of Bardeen, a theory of the tunneling phenomenon has
been derived, and from that framework an application to STM has been showed, repeating the
derivation of the Tersoff-Hamann formula for the tunneling current.
Experimental work in a UHV system has been performed in order to study the effect of
coverage over the self-assembled structures of TMA on Ag(111). Superstructures with features
comparable to those reported for trimesic acid on Au(111) have been found.
Annealing to different temperatures in the range 300-420 K has been employed in order to
study the modifications to the superstructures formed by trimesic acid on Ag(111). A range of
novel structures has been observed.