Atomic structure of the Ge(15 3 23) surface

We report a stable germanium surface (15 3 23), which among all known stable germanium as well as silicon surfaces is the only one inside the unit stereographic triangle and has the highest indices. On the basis of high-resolution dual-bias scanning tunneling microscope images, a detailed model has been proposed for it for further investigation. The surface does not consist of nanometer facets of any other stable surfaces while some unstable surfaces, such as (102), may facet to including {15 3 23} facets, and thus is also a major stable surface, the same as (001), (111), (113), etc.