Epitaxial ordering of a perylenetetracarboxylic diimide-melamine supramolecular network driven by the Au(111)-(22×√3 ) reconstruction

Substrate mediated ordering and intermolecular interactions are used to create a long-range supramolecular network of perylenetetracarboxylic diimide and melamine on a reconstructed Au(111)-(22×√3 ) surface. Scanning tunneling microscopy reveals that the network is composed of a succession of double width honeycomb cell rows separated by a more closely packed row of parallelograms. This periodicity of the supramolecular configuration matches that of the reconstructed gold substrate allowing an epitaxial relationship between network and substrate reconstruction.