Induced Charge-Density Oscillations at Metal Surfaces

Induced charge-density (ICD) oscillations at the Cu(111) surface caused by an external impurity are studied within linear response theory. The calculation takes into account such properties of the Cu(111) surface electronic structure as an energy gap for three-dimensional (3D) bulk electrons and a $s-p_z$ surface state that forms two-dimensional (2D) electron system. It is demonstrated that the coexistence of these 2D and 3D electron systems has profound impact on the ICD in the surface region. In the case of a static impurity the characteristic ICD oscillations with the $1/\rho^2$ decay as a function of lateral distance, $\rho$, are established in both electron systems. For the impurity with a periodically time-varying potential, the novel dominant ICD oscillations which fall off like $\sim1/\rho$ are predicted.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figure

Surface and Image-Potential States on the MgB_2(0001) Surfaces

We present a self-consistent pseudopotential calculation of surface and image-potential states on $MgB_2(0001)$ for both $B$-terminated ($B-t$) and $Mg$-terminated ($Mg-t$) surfaces. We find a variety of very clear surface and subsurface states as well as resonance image-potential states n=1,2 on both surfaces. The surface layer DOS at $E_F$ is increased by 55% at $B-t$ and by 90% at the $Mg-t$ surface compared to DOS in the corresponding bulk layers.Comment: 3 pages, 6 figure

A first-principles study of MgB2 (0001) surfaces

We report self-consistent {\it ab initio} calculations of structural and electronic properties for the B- and Mg-terminated MgB$_{2}$ (0001) surfaces. We employ ultra-soft pseudopotentials and plane wave basis sets within the generalized gradient approximation. The surface relaxations are found to be small for both B- and Mg-terminated surfaces. For the B-terminated surface, both B ${\sigma}$ and ${\pi}$ surface bands appear, while only one B ${\pi}$ surface band exists near the Fermi level for the Mg-terminated surface. The superconductivity of the MgB$_2$ surfaces is discussed. The work function is predicted to be 5.95 and 4.25 eV for the B- and Mg-terminated surfaces respectively. The simulated scanning tunneling microscopy images of the surfaces are not sensitive to the sign and value of the bias voltages, but depend strongly on the tip-sample distance. An image reversal is predicted for the Mg-terminated surface.Comment: 3 pages, 4 figures, Revte

Surface states and their possible role in the superconductivity of MgB2

We report layer-Korringa-Kohn-Rostocker calculations for bulk and surface states as well as the corresponding angle resolved photoemission (ARPES) intensities of MgB2. Our theoretical results reproduce very well the recent ARPES data by Uchiyama et al., cond-mat/0111152. At least two surface states are assigned. Consequences of SFS on the anisotropy of the upper critical fields and other properties in the superconducting state of small grains in micropowder samples are briefly discussed.Comment: 4pages, 6figures, corrected typos, references adde

Quasiparticle dynamics in ferromagnetic compounds of the Co-Fe and Ni-Fe systems

We report a theoretical study of the quasiparticle lifetime and the quasiparticle mean free path caused by inelastic electron-electron scattering in ferromagnetic compounds of the Co-Fe and Ni-Fe systems. The study is based on spin-polarized calculations, which are performed within the $GW$ approximation for equiatomic and Co- and Ni-rich compounds, as well as for their constituents. We mainly focus on the spin asymmetry of the quasiparticle properties, which leads to the spin-filtering effect experimentally observed in spin-dependent transport of hot electrons and holes in the systems under study. By comparing with available experimental data on the attenuation length, we estimate the contribution of the inelastic mean free path to the latter.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figure