In scanning probe microscopy, the imaging characteristics in the various interaction channels crucially depend on the chemical termination of the probe tip. Here we analyze the contrast signatures of an oxygen-terminated copper tip with a tetrahedral configuration of the covalently bound terminal O atom. Supported by first-principles calculations we show how this tip termination can be identified by contrast analysis in noncontact atomic force and scanning tunneling microscopy (NC-AFM, STM) on a partially oxidized Cu(110) surface. After controlled tip functionalization by soft indentations of only a few angstroms in an oxide nanodomain, we demonstrate that this tip allows imaging an organic molecule adsorbed on Cu(110) by constant-height NC-AFM in the repulsive force regime, revealing its internal bond structure. In established tip functionalization approaches where, for example, CO or Xe is deliberately picked up from a surface, these probe particles are only weakly bound to the metallic tip, leading to lateral deflections during scanning. Therefore, the contrast mechanism is subject to image distortions, artifacts, and related controversies. In contrast, our simulations for the O-terminated Cu tip show that lateral deflections of the terminating O atom are negligible. This allows a detailed discussion of the fundamental imaging mechanisms in high-resolution NC-AFM experiments. With its structural rigidity, its chemically passivated state, and a high electron density at the apex, we identify the main characteristics of the O-terminated Cu tip, making it a highly attractive complementary probe for the characterization of organic nanostructures on surfaces.

Supported metal nanoparticles form the basis of heterogeneous catalysts. Above a certain nanoparticle size, it is generally assumed that adsorbates bond in an identical fashion as on a semiinfinite crystal. This assumption has allowed the database on metal single crystals accumulated over the past 40 years to be used to model heterogeneous catalysts. Using a surface science approach to CO adsorption on supported Pd nanoparticles, we show that this assumption may be flawed. Near-edge X-ray absorption fine structure measurements, isolated to one nanoparticle, show that CO bonds upright on the nanoparticle top facets as expected from single-crystal data. However, the CO lateral registry differs from the single crystal. Our calculations indicate that this is caused by the strain on the nanoparticle, induced by carpet growth across the substrate step edges. This strain also weakens the COmetal bond, which will reduce the energy barrier for catalytic reactions, including CO oxidation.nanoparticle | carpet growth | surface strain | adsorption | scanning tunneling microscopy N anoparticles exhibit properties distinct from their bulk counterparts (1-3). For instance, semiconductor particles smaller than ∼10 nm act as quantum dots (1-4) and oxide-supported gold nanoparticles are active for a variety of reactions including CO oxidation (5), water-gas-shift reaction (6), and epoxidation (7), whereas gold itself is not. Nanoclusters composed of ∼10 atoms have been shown to be exceptionally catalytically active for some reactions on some metals (8, 9). When the particle size is reduced, the relative number of undercoordinated atoms at the edges and corners increases. The proportion of perimeter sites at the interface between the metal and the support also increases. All these sites have been shown to play a crucial role in some reactions (10, 11). Reducing the particle size can also lead to a decrease in the interatomic bond length in small metal clusters (12, 13), which in the case of Pd nanoparticles results in lower adsorption energies for both CO (14,15) and O 2 (16), although such weakening of CO binding on the nanoparticle can also arise from other factors such as encapsulation of the nanoparticles by the support (17).The role of the support in modifying nanoparticle properties has also been recognized. For instance, the strong metal support interaction has been known for some time (2) and charge transfer either to or from the nanoparticles can lead to enhanced reactivity (18). More recently, it has come to light that the particle size itself may be governed by the interaction with the support (19). However, one effect that has not been discussed and yet should be present in any nanoparticle-support system is the influence of the support morphology such as steps.Here, we investigate the role of the support morphology on the reactivity of metal nanoparticles using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM). As our test system we choose Pd nanoparticles (20, 21) supported on TiO 2 (110) (22) simply because much is known about bo...