Scanning tunneling microscopy on rough surfaces: Deconvolution of constant current images

Abstract

This letter critically discusses the topographical information obtained by scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) on surfaces with a mesoscopic roughness, i.e., in the range of some nm’s. In a foregoing publication [J. Appl. Phys. 67, 1156 (1990)], we already treated the evaluation of constant current images based on the knowledge of the real surface and the shape of the tunneling tip (‘‘tip shape limited resolution’’). Now we deal with the invers problem: the reconstruction of the real surface topography based on the corresponding STM image and the tip shape, using a simple, straightforward formalism.