Desiging Artificial Lieb Lattice on Metal Surface

TL;DR

This paper proposes a theoretical method to create an artificial Lieb lattice on a metal surface using a molecule pattern, enabling the study of flat band physics through electron localization and interference.

Contribution

It introduces a novel design for an artificial Lieb lattice on metal surfaces, facilitating experimental exploration of flat band phenomena.

Findings

Lattice geometry induces a flat electronic band.

Electron localization explained by interference effects.

Potential for experimental realization and flat band studies.

Abstract

Recently, several experiments have illustrated that metal surface electrons can be manipulated to form a two dimensional (2D) lattice by depositing a designer molecule lattice on metal surface. This offers a promising new technique to construct artificial 2D electron lattices. Here we theoretically propose a molecule lattice pattern to realize an artificial Lieb lattice on metal surface, which shows a flat electronic band due to the lattice geometry. We show that the localization of electrons in the flat band may be understood from the viewpoint of electron interference, which may be probed by measuring the local density of states with the scanning tunnelling microscopy. Our proposal may be readily implemented in experiment and may offer an ideal solid state platform to investigate the novel flat band physics of the Lieb lattice.