The healing mechanism for excited molecules near metallic surfaces

Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technology, 600 Mountain Avenue, Murray Hill, NJ07974(Dated: February 2, 2008)Radiation damage prevents the ability to obtain images from individual molecules. We suggestthat this problem can be avoided for organic molecules by placing them in close proximity witha metallic surface. The molecules will then quickly dissipate any electronic excitation via theircoupling to the metal surface. They may therefore be observed for a number of elastic scatteringevents that is sufficient to determine their structure.