Mott phase at the surface of 1T-TaSe2 observed by scanning tunneling microscopy.
In this Letter we report the observation, by scanning tunneling microscopy, of a Mott metal to insulator transition at the surface of 1T-TaSe2. Our spectroscopic data compare considerably well with previous angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy measurements and confirm the presence of a large hysteresis related to a first order process. The local character of the tunneling spectroscopy technique allows a direct visualization of the surface symmetry and provides spectroscopic measurements on the defect-free region of the sample. It follows that the electronic localization is driven purely by the enhancement of the charge density wave amplitude which drives a bandwidth controlled metal-insulator transition.
Colonna
Stefano
S
CNR Istituto di Struttura della Materia, Via Fosso del Cavaliere, 100, 00133 Roma Italy.
Ronci
Fabio
F
Cricenti
Antonio
A
Perfetti
Luca
L
Berger
Helmuth
H
Grioni
Marco
M