Monolayers of simple organic molecules on silicon studied by surface tools

Simple organic molecules such as 1‐octadecene, 1‐tetradecene, 1‐dodecyne and 1,13‐tetradecadiene have been grafted to hydrogenated B‐doped silicon (100) surfaces. Such substrate has been obtained by etching commercial native oxide‐capped flat crystal silicon wafers with procedures involving dilute HF aqueous solutions, but also by hydrogenation with a new method involving treatment of the wafer in an oven with H 2 gas. The functionalization of such a surface has been done by using described wet methodologies involving pure liquids or solutions with thermal activation of the hydride. Contact angle, ESCA, atomic force microscopy (AFM) and time‐of‐flight secondary ion mass spectroscopy (ToF‐SIMS) measurements have been carried out to characterize the above systems. Particular emphasis is devoted to the interpretation of the ToF‐SIMS spectra, seldom used until now to characterize organic monolayers.