WnSm: Possible material for new fullerene structures

As the layered semiconductor material WS2 in bulk is similar to graphite, it is of interest to find out whether this material might form small stable cage-like fullerene structures. In combination with density functional theory calculation and gas phase mass and photoelectron spectroscopy, certain magic clusters were deposited in soft-landing mode on Ag- and Si-substrates. In gas phase theoretically predicted 2-dimensional triangular shaped platelets of WnSm-clusters with n>5 were detected and similar structures of MonSm were studied. For first measurements deposited W1S3-, W2S6- and W5S6-clusters known as particularly stable in gas phase experiments were investigated via HREELS and XPS. These data were compared to WS2 bulk material, additionally