Needles and clusters of zinc porphyrin molecules on mica

Molecular monolayers of zinc porphyrins deposited from a liquid solution on mica substrates have been characterised using atomic force microscopy (AFM). At room temperature, needle-shaped single layer porphyrin islands are formed due to an anisotropic growth rate. The average island size depends on the concentration of the porphyrin solution, but the length to width aspect ratio is rather independent of the island size. Annealing the porphyrin monolayers to 450 K leads to the reduction of the size of the monolayer islands in two different ways depending on the heating rate. With slow heating rate, the island size was found to shrink by losing molecules from the edge of the island. With high heating rate, nanoscale molecular clusters were found to form.