Driven by the reduction of dangling bonds and the minimization of surface stress, reconstruction of silicon surfaces leads to a striking diversity of outcomes. Despite this variety even very elaborate structures are generally comprised of a small num
ber of structural building blocks. We here identify important elementary building blocks and discuss their integration into the structural models as well as their impact on the electronic structure of the surface.
A new structural model for the Si(331)-(12x1) reconstruction is proposed. Based on scanning tunneling microscopy images of unprecedented resolution, low-energy electron diffraction data, and first-principles total-energy calculations, we demonstrate
that the reconstructed Si(331) surface shares the same elementary building blocks as the Si(110)-(16x2) surface, establishing the pentamer as a universal building block for complex silicon surface reconstructions.
