Alternative Methods for Leed Ivsurface Structural Determination: Direct Methods and Analysis of Off-normal Incidence Curves

Low-energy electron diffraction takes advantage of strong interactions between electrons and atoms to achieve highly sensitive and accurate surface structural determinations. The prize to pay for that sensitivity is that an appropriated analysis should include costly multiple scattering calculations. Dynamical LEED-IV calculations based on a trial and error procedure, present some limitations for obtaining the atomic structure of the surfaces. For example, when you do not have any hint for the surface geometry, the number and range of the parameters that one has to explore is very high. Moreover, the minimization procedure of the R factor involved in the trial and error method could lead to several occurrences of minima in the R factor. In order to solve the two abovementioned limitations, we introduce two alternative procedures, both based on recording LEED-IV curves at non-normal incident angles.