The arrangement of single gold and palladium atoms deposited on the surface of a 3 monolayer thin film of MgO was investigated using low-temperature scanning tunneling microscopy. While Pd atoms are arranged in a random fashion, Au forms an ordered array on the surface. The long-range ordering as well as the scanning tunneling microscopy appearance of single Au atoms on a 3 monolayer thin MgO film can be explained by partial charge transfer from the substrate to Au atoms as predicted recently by density functional theory calculations [Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 226104 (2005)10.1103/PhysRevLett.94.226104]. In contrast with that, Au atoms on a thick film were found to be essentially neutral.

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