Fig. 4

Reaction process and its evidences. a, b STM images of the sample by annealing to 370 K. Various different intermediate and final products are pointed by different colored arrows, except the white circled organometallic species. c The reaction process of the formation of H-type product 4 from molecule 6 on Ag(111). d Br-tip LT-STM image of the edge of H-type molecular island. e STM image of the sample upon fast annealing from 315 to 420 K. f, g CO-tip LT-STM image of the non-covalent dimer composed by monomers after cyclization, with and without superimposed molecular models. h Laplace and fast Fourier transform (FFT) filtered STM image of the non-covalent dimer in f. Tunneling parameters: a V = −1.5 V, I = −0.3 nA; b V = −2.2 V, I = −0.2 nA; d, e V = 0.6 V, I = 0.5 nA; f V = 0.3 V, I = 0.5 nA. Color code: C, gray; H, white; Br, red