Ernst G. Bauer

Ernst G. Bauer (born 1928) is a German-American physicist. He is well known for his studies in the field of [surface science]. His most outstanding contributions are his work on establishing thin film growth and nucleation mechanisms, and his invention in 1962 of the Low Energy Electron Microscopy (LEEM) which came to fruition in 1985 in the Arbeitsgruppe of Ernst Bauer in Germany. In the early 90thies he extended the LEEM technique in two important directions by developing Spin-Polarized Low Energy Electron Microscopy (SPLEEM) and Spectroscopic Photo Emission and Low Energy Electron Microscopy (SPELEEM). He is currently Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus at the Arizona State University.

Ernst Bauer studied at the Universität München, Germany, where he received his Master's degree MS (1953) and Doctor of Philosophy PhD (1955) degrees in physics. In 1958 he moved to the Michelson Laboratory in China Lake, California, where he became the Head of the Crystal Physics Branch and a U.S. citizen. He assumed the position of Professor and Director of the Physics Institute at the Technical University Clausthal, Germany, in 1969. He was appointed Distinguished Research Professor in 1991 at the Arizona State University. He continued his research activity in Germany until 1996. Since 1996 he was working full-time at the Arizona State University, and since 2010 he is Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus working part-time in ASU.

Ernst Bauer has contributed to the field of epitaxy and film growth since the mid-1950s. He started his scientific career in Munich with the study of the growth and structure of antireflection layers with electron microscopy and electron diffraction. His PhD thesis was concerned with the structure and growth of thin evaporated layers of ionic materials and was the first systematic extensive study of epitaxial and fiber orientation growth combining electron microscopy and electron diffraction. This experimental work stimulated a basic contribution to the theory of epitaxy. He derived in 1958 a classification of the basic thin film growth modes, which he called Frank-van der Merwe (layer-by-layer growth), Volmer-Weber (island growth) and Stranski-Krastanov growth (layer+island growth). His thermodynamic criterion and terminology are used worldwide today. In the same year Ernst Bauer's book on "Electron diffraction: theory, practice and application" appeared.

Soon after his arrival at the Michelson Laboratory in California, surface science was born. He was involved early in it in order to understand thin film phenomena. In this period he started in situ thin film growth studies by conventional electron microscopy, Ultra high vacuum UHV reflection electron diffraction, Low-energy electron diffraction LEED and Auger electron spectroscopy. The importance of adsorption on the initial growth of thin films led him also to adsorption studies.

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