X-ray photoelectron diffraction investigation of the cleavage plane in 1T1T-transition metal dichalcogenides

We present a detailed study of the three members of the 1T1T-transition metal dichalcogenides: TiSe2TiSe2, TaSe2TaSe2 and TaS2TaS2 by means of the X-ray photoelectron diffraction combined with single-scattering simulations. Our simulations of different surface terminations and their comparison with the measured diffraction patterns allow to determine that the cleavage occurs within the van der Waals gap. Single-scattering calculations are shown to simulate very well the measured diffractograms on these compounds.