High-temperature desorption of C60 covalently bound to 6H-SiC(0001)-(3x3)

The desorption or fragmentation temperature of C-60 bound to Si-rich-(3 x 3) and (root 3 x root 3) R30 degrees. reconstructions of 6H-SiC(0001) is investigated using inverse photoemission spectroscopy (IPES) and LEED experiments. On SiC-(3 x 3), C-60 film is found desorbed after annealing at a high temperature of 1140 K, supporting covalent bonding. Meanwhile, the Si tetramers of the (3 x 3) nanostructured substrate are recovered, as can be inferred from the full reappearance of the Mott-Hubbard surface state in the IPE spectra. SiC-(3 x 3) behaves in a singular way among the other semiconducting substrates, which covalently bind to C-60. This remarkable feature is attributed to the low density of Si dangling bonds and to the highly corrugated character of this reconstruction